The enormous heat pumps warming cities

The fields of Cornwall in south-west England are covered in snow due to yet another cold snap.However, Ceri Simmons’s house is toasty warm down a winding lane.

She has a jungle of hanging plants in her living room, and through the kitchen, you can see a studio with wood walls where she teaches aerial yoga.She adds, “Having a warm house is important for my clients as well as lovely for me.”

The Simmons family’s isolated village of Stithians, which is close to the most south-westerly point of the UK mainland, has emerged as an unlikely frontier in the race to decarbonize heating.