Urban Sustainability: Recovering and Utilizing Urban Excess Heat

Kristina Lygnerud () and Sarka Langer
Additional contact information
Kristina Lygnerud: IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute, SE-400 14 Göteborg, Sweden
Sarka Langer: IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute, SE-400 14 Göteborg, Sweden

Energies, 2022, vol. 15, issue 24, 1-11

Abstract: Urban heat sources from urban infrastructure and buildings could meet ~10% of the European building heating demand. There is, however, limited information on how to use them. The EU project ReUseHeat has generated much of the existing knowledge on urban waste heat recovery implementation. Heat recovery from a data center, hospital and from water were demonstrated. Additionally, the project generated knowledge of stakeholders, risk profile, bankability and business models. The recovery of urban waste heat is characterized by high potential, high competitiveness compared to other heating alternatives, high avoidance of GHG emissions, payback within three years and low utilization. These characteristics reveal that barriers for increased utilization exist. The barriers are not technical. Instead, the absence of a waste heat EU level policy adds risk. Other showstoppers are low knowledge on the urban waste heat opportunity and new stakeholder relationships being needed for successful recovery. By combining key results and lessons learned from the project this article outlines the frontier of urban waste heat recovery research and practice in 2022.

Keywords: district heating; urban waste heat; demonstration sites; business aspects (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: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/24/9466/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/24/9466/ (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:15:y:2022:i:24:p:9466-:d:1002783

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 ().