We design heat so people live well, communities thrive and the planet can heal.
Generation 7 exists because most heat systems were never designed with life in mind. Estates are trying to decarbonise with kit that is tired, data that is patchy and budgets that feel squeezed from every angle. Our roadmap is about changing that, one estate at a time.
From single plant rooms to whole places
Our work starts in the plant rooms and pipe runs that keep buildings alive, then zooms out to the streets, wards and homes those systems serve. We are focused on estates where comfort, cost and carbon sit on the same agenda: hospitals, government buildings, campuses, housing and civic heat networks.
In most of these places, the pattern is familiar. Boilers long past their best. Steam that nobody loves but everybody depends on. Controls that only one person really understands. Tariffs designed years ago that no longer reflect reality. Everyone is working hard and still the system feels brittle.
This is where we are building: in the gap between technical possibility and lived experience.
Heat is invisible until it fails
When heat works, nobody thinks about it. When it fails, everything stops. Care is cancelled. Buildings close. Staff and residents lose faith. At the same time, heat is often the single largest source of emissions on an estate and a major driver of operating cost. Getting it right is no longer optional.
From better briefs to living heat networks
Rather than start with technology, we start with the life around it: patients, staff, residents, operators, budgets and carbon limits. Then we design heat flows that respect all of them. The roadmap below shows how that takes shape across an estate.
Drag sideways to follow the path
Make the invisible system visible
We map how heat really moves today. Not just on drawings, but in operation: who touches what, where the pinch points are, how it feels on the ground.
- Whole-estate heat map that links plant, pipework and places.
- Simple shared language for risk, comfort and performance.
- Clear view of what must not fail and what can flex.
Design projects that actually work
With that map in hand, we shape briefs, designs and phasing plans that estates can live with and contractors can build from.
- Investment plans aligned with clinical, academic or civic priorities.
- Phased designs that keep services running while systems change.
- Low-temperature and network ready solutions where they add value.
Turn heat into a shared asset
Over time, heat networks stop being a liability and start behaving like civic infrastructure that supports wider places and partners.
- Networks that connect hospitals, homes and civic buildings.
- Waste heat used on site or shared with neighbours.
- Operating models that support teams rather than stretching them.
Leave a system the future can trust
The decisions taken now become inheritance for the teams who follow. We design so that future engineers, estates leads and residents are glad this work was done the way it was.
- Networks that are easy to read, maintain and adapt.
- Data that reflects reality and informs everyday decisions.
- Places that stay warm, cool and affordable in a changing climate.
A lesson from a mountain village
Generation 7 grew out of a small hydropower project in a highland village
in the Philippines. The engineering challenge was real, but the lesson that
stayed was human. Heat, water, labour and care were all part of one living system.
Nothing was wasted. Everything had a relationship with everything else.
That experience changed how we look at modern estates. Hospitals and campuses
can feel very far from a mountain community, yet the principle is the same:
if you design in isolation, you create hidden costs. If you design with
the whole system in mind, you create value that lasts.
Your estate, your constraints, our job
Every estate we meet has its own history, pressures and politics. Our job is to respect that reality while opening up more possibility. We bring engineering depth, curiosity and a habit of asking simple but awkward questions until the real picture is clear.
Sometimes the work is a strategic heat roadmap. Sometimes it is design assurance on a major project. Sometimes it is sitting with teams in plant rooms for a day to understand why a network never behaves quite as the model says. In each case the aim is the same: to leave you with more clarity, more options and systems that feel easier to live with.
We’re not in the business of heat.
We’re in the business of helping people live well.
Heat just happens to be the most influential, least understood system shaping health, comfort and carbon. This roadmap is our attempt to redesign it — so people thrive, communities flourish and the planet can heal.
What we are doing
A new way to design heat
We’re redesigning how heat moves through estates, towns and cities so it works *for* life, not against it.
Replacing guesswork with intelligence
Most heat systems are oversized, over-engineered or failing quietly. We build systems that respond to people, place and actual need — not one-size-fits-all assumptions.
Helping clients avoid regret
Buildings last 80+ years. Mistakes do too. We help estates make choices that still make sense in 2040, 2050 and beyond.
Why it matters now
Heat is half the problem
Heating and cooling make up ~50% of UK energy use. If we don’t fix heat, we don’t fix climate.
But the system is broken
Estates full of ageing boilers, short-term fixes and unplanned upgrades create spiralling costs and avoidable carbon.
Future infrastructure is being decided now
Every estate replacing kit today is locking in the next 20–30 years. We help organisations choose a path they won’t regret.
Our Roadmap
1. See the whole estate
Data, load patterns, real behaviours — we map the true picture before anyone touches a spanner.
2. Reimagine the flows
Where heat comes from, where it goes, where it’s wasted — and how to turn losses into assets.
3. Design for people, place and planet
Low-temperature networks, flexible zones, integrated renewables, community-shaped systems.
4. Build what future generations won’t curse
Systems that are upgradeable, repairable and coherent over decades — not disposable in ten years.
The future belongs to systems that help people live well.
And heat — unglamorous, invisible, underestimated heat — is one of the biggest levers we have. Fix heat, and you lift comfort, cost and carbon at the same time. That’s the world we’re building toward.
Horizon 1 — Fix today’s failures
Reduce waste. Stabilise comfort. Make heat visible. Better briefs. Better decisions. Better building-level logic. This is what 99 percent of clients actually need first.
Horizon 2 — Connect the estate
Waste heat recovery. Load balancing. Linking buildings. Shared networks. Better sensors. Better control logic. Human movement + heat flow modelling. This is where the magic begins.
Horizon 3 — Build the community layer
Neighbourhood-scale loops. Sharing energy. Using local resources. Engaging communities. Designing governance. Strengthening resilience. This is where heat becomes a civic asset.
Horizon 4 — Regenerative Systems
Closed loops. Circular energy flows. Heating + cooling + ecology. Energy as part of life. Restoring environment. Supporting health & wellbeing. Long-term prosperity. The line connects all of them.
Why It Matters Now
The UK is in the middle of the biggest transformation of its energy systems since the Industrial Revolution — but most places aren’t ready.Estates are running on equipment older than the people who operate it.Bills keep rising faster than budgets.Net Zero targets are approaching faster than teams can adapt.And heat — the thing every building needs — is the part no one wants to touch.Meanwhile, the stakes keep growing:• 40 percent of carbon emissions come from heat.• 70 percent of public-sector estates need major upgrades.• Millions of people are living or working in spaces that feel cold, stuffy, expensive or unpredictable.This is not just an engineering problem.It’s a wellbeing problem.A financial problem.A community problem.A future-generations problem.And it’s becoming urgent.
Broken economics
36 percent of a UK public estate’s energy spend is heat — yet most systems lose between 20–60 percent of what they generate before it reaches people. That’s millions wasted every year, money that could fund staff, services, social care or education.
Ageing infrastructure
Much of Britain’s heat estate was built for a different century. Oversized boilers, unbalanced networks, no data visibility, rising outages and repairs papering over deeper structural issues.
A skills and capacity gap
Estate teams are stretched. Decarbonisation deadlines are accelerating. And every upgrade requires navigating conflicting advice, contractor silos and systems no one fully “owns”.
Communities who feel the impact first
When heat fails, life stops.Care homes become unsafe.Hospitals delay surgeries.Families choose between comfort and cost.Businesses lose productivity.This isn’t just an engineering issue.It’s a social, economic, and ecological one.