Eye Town Hall is a local Town Hall with a main hall which is hired out to local organisations for meetings and functions; this is two storeys high, and the lobby area comprising kitchen and toilet areas with the Council Chamber on an upper floor. The building also incorporates a clock tower.

The Town Hall is located in Broad Street, Eye, Suffolk.

The Hall, (which measures approximately 26x19m) was built at the end of the 19th century and was being re-roofed and had been out of use since the spring of 2010.

The building was heated using gas quartz radiant heaters which were at the end of their useful lives and some appeared to be in a very poor condition/not being used. There were also two electric infra-red heaters in the Council Chamber.

Domestic hot water was supplied by a Mark 5 Heatrae Sadia point of use electric heater in the kitchen with a 7 litre tank plus a Chaffeteux gas fired water heater over the basin in the Gents’ Toilet.

The Town Council was keen to assess the possibilities for heating and hot water systems from renewable energy sources. The overall aim was to offer the Hall for Community use for as little as possible, hence the need for low running costs.

In November 2010, JSH conducted a site survey and provided advice on alternative methods of providing space heating for the hall and heating the domestic hot water.

The options considered were as follows:

• Solar Thermal Hot Water Systems
• Photovoltaic (PV) Cells
• Wind Turbines
• Heat Pumps (ground/air/water source)
• Geothermal
• Biomass Heating
• Anaerobic Digestion

The recommended option and that which was taken forward by the Town Hall Management Committee was the scheme incorporating air source heat pumps, along with “oversized” LTHW radiators throughout and also providing DHW all controlled by a seven-day timer unit.

The savings in subsequent running costs and CO² emissions were £992 per annum and 45,681 kWh, (-5.4) tonnes per annum respectively.