Kensa’s AR climate change campaign hailed by industry as digital innovation

An augmented reality (AR) climate change campaign delivered by Kensa Group recently won the Heat and Efficiency: Digital Innovation Award at the 2022 Association for Decentralised Energy (ADE) Awards.

The ADE is the leading trade organisation whose members deliver a range of solutions encompassing District Heating & Cooling and Energy Efficiency and work together to advocate the UK’s priorities for achieving net zero.

Through the award-winning ‘Welcome to Green Street’ campaign, Kensa used ground-breaking AR technology and immersive storytelling to bring to life a greener future in which whole communities make the switch from gas boilers to ground source heat pumps.

Using the real-life inner-city suburb of Green Street in Glasgow as a basis for the AR experience, virtual tour guide ‘Doug’ sets out how the current gas grid could be replaced with renewable infrastructure in an interactive fly-through, demystifying ground source technology and showcasing its benefits.

Stephanie Gregory, Marketing Director at Kensa Group, says: “We are very proud that the ‘Welcome to Green Street campaign’ has been recognised as a leading digital innovation in this field.

“We wanted to create a shift in how people think about heat pumps and how they heat their homes. For the UK to achieve our carbon reduction commitments, all of us, across society, policy, industry and the economy must be connected to this united goal.”

Launched to a global audience at the pivotal COP26 climate change summit in 2021, ‘Welcome to Green Street’ delivers a vitally important message about how the UK can tackle climate change and leaves the valuable legacy of a blueprint detailing how communities can switch to renewable heating technology.

The government is aiming for 600,000 heat pumps to be installed every year by 2028. The award-winning digital campaign demonstrates Kensa’s pioneering solution to this challenge. To facilitate the widespread roll-out of the technology, Kensa is urging key stakeholders to focus efforts on street-by-street installations of networked heat pumps, rather than replacing gas boilers on a house-by-house basis.

The use of engaging and accessible mobile-based augmented reality technology aims to break down the perceived barriers to the widescale electrification of heat and showcase to policymakers and the public that networked heat pumps can achieve decarbonisation goals at scale for the lowest cost.

Stephanie continues: “It is one thing to make low-carbon heating technologies available, but it is entirely a different matter to achieve their installation in homes and their adoption for use on a mass scale. Our work at Kensa is not just theorising – we are developing models based on real-life urban communities – and providing a blueprint that can be rolled out across the country.”