SUSTAINABILITY
District heating is one of the most innovative and sustainable methods of space heating available today. It is also founded on incredibly simple principles.
Rather than each home in a community having individual boilers, district heating works by siphoning wasted heat energy from a central power plant and pumping it through a network of pipes to each home in the region.
As such, district heating prevents the unnecessary waste of thermal energy, meaning that bills are lower and emissions decrease.
And while district heating does require large investments in infrastructure, it is a system that is achievable with the tools, building profiles and climates of most countries.
Take Denmark, for example. It is a coastal nation in Northern Europe where temperatures can drop below-30 ° C, yet district heating is able to serve around 98 % of buildings in the capital city of Copenhagen.
In fact, district heating is such a timeless concept that ancient Romans used to redirect the heat from their public baths to other buildings in close proximity.
Today, district heating can make use of the waste energy generated by all kinds of facilities, including incinerators, power plants, heavy industry sites and data centres.
So, given all its benefits, why exactly has district heating failed to catch on as a universal solution, and what is being done to roll it out further?
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