Chris Davidson, CTO of Genius Energy Lab, explores the DfE’s school rebuilding strategy and how ground source heat pumps align with heating demand
The Department for Education is now one of the UK’s largest construction clients, with the Education Estates Directorate delivering over £2 billion in capital works each year.
Through the School Rebuilding Programme alone, the government has committed almost £20bn through to 2034-35 to rebuild more than 750 schools and sixth-form colleges across England. More than 500 schools are already in the programme, with a further 250 schools set to be selected by early 2027.
It must represent one of the largest long-term public construction pipelines currently active in the UK market.
But the significance lies not only in the volume of work entering procurement – it’s in the changing expectations around how these buildings are expected to perform and be monitored once complete.
New DfE schools need to be built to last
The DfE’s latest Education Estates Strategy makes clear that the estate is now being viewed through a much longer-term lens: operational resilience, climate adaptation, running costs and building performance are all moving closer to the centre of procurement thinking.
It reflects the pressures facing the estate. The government reports that 32% of schools already report overheating in at least one building, while many sites face growing flood risks and ageing infrastructure after decades of underinvestment. At the same time, schools and universities account for an estimated 36% of public sector building emissions.
Against that backdrop, the timing of the Department’s new Construction Framework 2025 (CF25), introduced in February, is significant – arriving at the same moment the next wave of School Rebuilding Programme projects moves from nomination to early design stages.
The contractor approach to heating strategy is evolving
Contractors positioning themselves for that pipeline need to recognise that their approach to heating strategy is evolving.
Under CF25, energy use must now be measured and reported more transparently, including separate monitoring of heating and hot water energy consumption and monthly Coefficient of Performance (COP) reporting for heating systems.
The framework has shifted (from CF21) toward a model that places greater emphasis on measured operational performance rather than theoretical compliance alone.
That changes what increasingly matters inside a bid.
Systems now need to demonstrate not only that they meet design-stage targets, but also that performance can be consistently evidenced once buildings are operational. Efficiency, operational stability, lifecycle performance and monitoring capability all become more commercially important in that environment.
Ground source heat pumps could stabilise school heating systems
This is one reason ground source heat pump systems (GSHPs) are gaining traction in educational projects: well-designed GSHPs tend to perform well under the kinds of long-term operational scrutiny CF25 requires.
School buildings place particular demands on heating infrastructure. They are predictably occupied throughout the day, expected to operate quietly, and designed for long operational lifespans with limited tolerance for major disruption once complete.
GSHP systems align well with those conditions because the ground itself becomes part of the site’s long-term infrastructure.
Buried ground arrays provide stable thermal performance across the year with minimal visual or acoustic impact. Unlike many surface-level systems, the underlying infrastructure can remain in place for generations – in some cases more than one hundred years – allowing heat pump plant to evolve over time without replacing the ground network itself.
Operational consistency is another important factor.
The ground temperature a few metres below the surface changes far less dramatically than external air temperatures across the year, which means system performance tends to remain more predictable through different seasons and operating conditions.
As a result, GSHPs deliver greater seasonal efficiency than many air-source systems during colder periods, alongside significantly lower operational carbon emissions than gas-based heating. Well-designed GSHP systems can achieve efficiencies over 400%, compared with typical air-source systems, which often operate at 200–234% efficiency, depending on conditions and system design.
With the new framework placing greater emphasis on measured building performance over time, those differences become increasingly relevant commercially.
Solar PV and wider electrification strategies
Schools also present a strong opportunity for integration with solar PV and wider electrification strategies. The DfE estimates that the school estate contains around 55 million square metres of roof space capable of supporting an additional 0.8–1.9GW of solar generation in its current condition.
Combined with heat pump systems, that creates opportunities to reduce operational costs over the long term while lowering exposure to fossil fuel price volatility. Government estimates suggest a typical school could save up to £25,000 per year through solar panels combined with complementary technologies such as batteries.
When heating infrastructure is considered as part of the wider estate energy strategy rather than as an isolated building service, the long-term economics begin to look very different.
The importance of whole-life carbon reporting in a functional heating system
As public sector procurement focuses more tightly on operational outcomes and long-term estate resilience, whole-life carbon performance is also becoming more commercially relevant.
Contractors bidding into DfE frameworks need to know that how systems perform over decades – rather than simply how they perform at handover – is getting greater attention.
On one 1MW comparison modelled over a 100-year lifecycle, a GSHP-led system produced approximately 8.3 million kg of lifetime carbon emissions compared with around 24.6 million kg for a gas and VRF-based alternative.
For education buildings expected to operate for many decades, those differences accumulate significantly over time.
All of the above does not mean GSHPs are automatically the correct answer for every school project.
What it does mean is that bids will increasingly reward systems capable of demonstrating operational stability, measurable efficiency and long-term resilience.
The success of ground source heat pumps depends on their early integration
The success of those systems, however, depends heavily on when they are considered within the project.
In my experience, the projects that perform most effectively are usually those where heating infrastructure is considered early enough to coordinate properly with the wider scheme.
We saw this directly through an £18.6m DfE decarbonisation pilot delivering GSHP systems across seven schools in Northern England. Working from feasibility through to design assurance, the project required careful alignment with DfE specifications, coordination across constrained sites, and detailed definition of ground and system assumptions before delivery could progress.
The experience reinforced how much project certainty depends on early clarity around infrastructure decisions.
Delivering DfE schools that perform for decades
As more projects move into procurement under CF25, the value of resolving those infrastructure questions early becomes much more commercially important.
The DfE describes the programme as a “stable pipeline of standardised projects” designed to give the construction sector confidence to invest in technology, training and innovative delivery approaches. Construction Framework 2025 itself lasts twice as long as the previous framework, providing greater long-term certainty for contractors and supply chains.
The contractors best positioned within this environment are unlikely to be those simply pursuing compliance at lowest upfront cost. They’ll be the teams capable of delivering buildings that perform reliably in operation, remain resilient over time and align with the DfE’s broader estate strategy.
Heating systems now sit much closer to that conversation than they did even a few years ago.
The DfE programme has created a rare moment of alignment between public investment, long-term estate thinking and low-carbon infrastructure.
The challenge now is to use that opportunity well: delivering school buildings that perform effectively for decades for the children, staff and communities that depend on them.
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