Increasing the UK's capacity for Combined Heat and Power generation (CHP) should yield considerable environmental and economic benefits, two Government reports reveal today.

Combined Heat and Power is a highly fuel-efficient process which sees the simultaneous generation of heat and power in a single process. This means it can produce greatly reduced levels of carbon dioxide emissions compared to the separate generation of heat and power e.g. via on-site boilers and fossil fuel power stations.

The reports, published as part of the requirements of the EC Cogeneration Directive, predict that over 10% of the UK's electricity will come from CHP generation by the end of 2010. It goes on to state that the economic potential exists to provide 17% of our total energy requirement from CHP.