More than £5 million of Government funding has been secured for Sheffield to help connect the Blackburn Meadows biomass plant — built on the site for the former Tinsley Towers — to the district energy network that heats public buildings across the city.

The money invested in Sheffield’s heating network will allow it to be expanded to areas such as the Retail Quarter and the Northern General Hospital, with the aim of reducing CO₂ emissions and improving air quality in the city.

This is the largest sum to be given to any individual project as part of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy’s Heat Networks Investment Project (HNIP).

Bryan Lodge, cabinet member for the Environment at Sheffield City Council, said: “This is great news for Sheffield.

Expanding our innovative district energy network by linkingit to additional renewable and sustainable energy sources will in turn lead to lower CO₂ emissions — not just because people will be using renewable energy rather than gas boilers, but also because using local fuel resources minimises any emissions generated by transportation.

“The existing district energy network, powered by the Bernard Road energy recovery facility, is near to capacity. However, expanding it to include the biomass plant at Blackburn Meadows will allow the reach of district heating to be increased.”