WAVE3 Project Balmoral Estate

Welcome to our project page! This space is designed to keep you informed and involved throughout the project. Here, you’ll find updates, key information, and a dedicated section for questions and answers. We encourage you to share your thoughts and queries openly every question helps us create a better outcome together. Please note that all questions and responses posted here are public. If you have something you’d prefer to discuss privately, feel free to contact retrofit@southend.gov.uk and one of our resident liaison officers will be able to assist you.

About the Project

We have secured funding through the government’s Warm Homes: Social Housing Fund Wave 3 to install ground source heat pumps in the Brecon, Balmoral, and Grampian tower blocks. Over the next two and a half years we will be replacing the heating systems in all council flats across the three blocks with ground source heat pumps. These are both cheaper and more environmentally friendly to run than existing forms of electric heating.

We are planning to start work on site in January 2026, with work due to run until January 2028. Much of this work will be external to the blocks, involving drilling and laying underground pipework to create the shared ground array, which allows each of the individual heat pumps to work. We will then progress to installing the necessary pipework in the communal areas such as the entrance area and hallways of the flat blocks before installing the heating equipment in each individual flat. Our installer will try to limit the amount of time taken installing equipment within each flat with the works planned to take 3 days at most.

As the ground source heat pumps are so much more efficient than current existing storage heaters, there should expect a significant reduction in heating bills every year. We estimate that over the course of a year, spending on heating will be reduced by as much as 50% compared to current usage.