Techno-Economic Analysis of Rural 4th Generation Biomass District Heating

Víctor M. Soltero, Ricardo Chacartegui, Carlos Ortiz and Gonzalo Quirosa
Additional contact information
Víctor M. Soltero: Department of Design Engineering, Universidad de Seville, 41011 Seville, Spain
Ricardo Chacartegui: Department of Energy Engineering, University of Seville, 41092 Seville, Spain
Carlos Ortiz: Department of Electronic and Electromagnetism, University of Seville, 41012 Seville, Spain
Gonzalo Quirosa: Department of Design Engineering, Universidad de Seville, 41011 Seville, Spain

Energies, 2018, vol. 11, issue 12, 1-20

Abstract: Biomass heating networks provide renewable heat using low carbon energy sources. They can be powerful tools for economy decarbonization. Heating networks can increase heating efficiency in districts and small size municipalities, using more efficient thermal generation technologies, with higher efficiencies and with more efficient emissions abatement technologies. This paper analyzes the application of a biomass fourth generation district heating, 4GDH (4th Generation Biomass District Heating), in a rural municipality. The heating network is designed to supply 77 residential buildings and eight public buildings, to replace the current individual diesel boilers and electrical heating systems. The development of the new fourth district heating generation implies the challenge of combining using low or very low temperatures in the distribution network pipes and delivery temperatures in existing facilities buildings. In this work biomass district heating designs based on third and fourth generation district heating network criteria are evaluated in terms of design conditions, operating ranges, effect of variable temperature operation, energy efficiency and investment and operating costs. The Internal Rate of Return of the different options ranges from 6.55% for a design based on the third generation network to 7.46% for a design based on the fourth generation network, with a 25 years investment horizon. The results and analyses of this work show the interest and challenges for the next low temperature DH generation for the rural area under analysis.

Keywords: low temperature district heating system; biomass district heating for rural locations; 4th generation district heating; CO 2 emissions abatement (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/11/12/3287/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/11/12/3287/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:11:y:2018:i:12:p:3287-:d:185387

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().