{"id":15406,"date":"2021-09-24T09:00:30","date_gmt":"2021-09-24T07:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/?p=15406"},"modified":"2024-03-12T17:53:27","modified_gmt":"2024-03-12T16:53:27","slug":"heat-from-a-distance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/industries\/heating\/heat-from-a-distance_15406\/","title":{"rendered":"Heat from a distance"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is a November morning in Asaa, a village in the north\u00adeast of Denmark. It is -5 degrees Celsius outside and a cold wind blows around the pedes\u00adtrians\u2019 ears. But, in a single-family home around the corner, it is nice and warm: the heating system provides a cozy warmth. Resi\u00addents in Asaa heat their homes with a clear conscience, because their heating system is climate neutral. The heat is produced using green elec\u00adtricity in the city\u2019s new central district heating system with help from a heat pump. The heat is gener\u00adated centrally and then distrib\u00aduted to houses via insu\u00adlated under\u00adground pipes. From there, it arrives in the single-family home\u2019s heating system.<\/p>\n

The system was designed by the engi\u00adneering firm Aktive Energi Anl\u00e6g A\/S (AEA) together with the \u00adrefrig\u00ader\u00ada\u00adtion expert EVAPCO and ebm-papst. It is suit\u00adable for villages with as few as 100 houses to small cities with 50,000 inhab\u00adi\u00adtants. AEA orga\u00adnized all of the suppliers and coor\u00addi\u00adnated the project with the local plant oper\u00adator. EVAPCO supplied the heat pump system and ebm-papst the fans. The three compa\u00adnies joined forces because they suddenly saw a new demand in the market.<\/p>\n

Tim Th\u00f8gersen, Sales Engi\u00adneer at EVAPCO, explains, \u201cUntil then, there were only small heat pumps for single-family houses or gigantic plants for big cities. But when the Danish govern\u00adment promoted district heating, there was suddenly a great deal of interest in medium-sized heat pumps for power stations that generate heat for small commu\u00adni\u00adties. Yet, there was no product avail\u00adable for this.\u201d<\/p>\n

A reverse dry cooler<\/h2>\n

Until then, EVAPCO in Denmark mainly produced customer-\u00adspe\u00adcific dry coolers for district heating plants or solar plants. Using fans, these dry coolers dissi\u00adpate waste heat\u200a\u2014\u200ain hot water, thermal oil or steam\u200a\u2014\u200ainto the ambient air. The manu\u00adfac\u00adturer has been working with ebm-papst for 15 years. The company devel\u00adoped heat pumps for the first time for the project in Asaa. Th\u00f8gersen says, \u201cIn prin\u00adciple, heat pumps are simple reverse dry coolers. A dry cooler cools water down, a heat pump heats water up. There\u00adfore, our main task was to use calcu\u00adla\u00adtions to find the right design so that every\u00adthing would work the way it was supposed to.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It is not unusual for district heating systems to be in the middle of a city. This means that the EC fans have to be quiet.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tim Th\u00f8gersen, Sales Engi\u00adneer at EVAPCO<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

A district heating system consists of an air\/water heat pump with 2.5 megawatts combined with seven energy absorbers. The energy absorbers contain EC axial fans that draw energy from the air and convey it into the system. EVAPCO fluc\u00adtu\u00adated between two suppliers when choosing the fan manu\u00adfac\u00adturer. In the end, ebm-papst\u2019s service gave it the edge: \u201cThe support we received from the Danish office was extra\u00ador\u00addi\u00adnary,\u201d says Th\u00f8gersen. \u201cAs soon as we get an order, every\u00adthing has to happen quickly. We have to give the energy suppliers an answer on the same day. ebm-papst always answered our inquiries within a few hours. They also had much shorter delivery times than its competitor.\u201d<\/p>\n

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WHAT IS DISTRICT HEATING?<\/h2>\n

<\/p>\n

District heating is gener\u00adated in a central power or heating plant. An own heating system is is not neces\u00adsary. An under\u00adground pipe system conducts the heat into the house. (Graphic | Statista)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Please work quietly<\/h2>\n

The noise level of the EC fans also played an impor\u00adtant role in selecting the partner. Th\u00f8gersen explains: \u201cIt is not unusual for district heating systems to be in the middle of a city, right next to resi\u00adden\u00adtial build\u00adings. Of course, this means that the EC fans have to be quiet. In this case we have the possi\u00adbility to use Flow\u00adGrids on our AxiBlade fans. They reduce the noise level by two dB(A).\u201d Tim Th\u00f8gersen also sees the control\u00adla\u00adbility of the EC fans as another advan\u00adtage. It is easy to turn the fans down when there are lower heating require\u00adments. This improves the system\u2019s effi\u00adciency and also decreases the noise.<\/p>\n

Seven energy absorbers in the district heating plant in Asaa absorb energy from the air. (Photo | EVAPCO)<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

There are around 80 AxiBlade EC fans in this district heating system and they gather ambient heat in every season. Torben Kirkolt, Managing Director of ebm-papst in Denmark, says: \u201cEven if the air is -10 degrees Celsius, it still contains energy.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, in the pilot project, minus temper\u00ada\u00adtures some\u00adtimes caused diffi\u00adcul\u00adties for the fans as they iced up. ebm-papst was able to remedy this with new soft\u00adware settings. Kirkolt explains, \u201cWe have now set the para\u00adme\u00adters so that the fans are always moving. Even if they are not being used, they simply shake the ice off.\u201d The \u201eFanSet\u201c app from ebm-papst helped them to adapt. Torben Kirkolt and his colleagues were able to acti\u00advate the para\u00adme\u00adters easily via MODBUS. He explains, \u201cYou simply put your mobile phone onto the fan and press a button. The app then uploads the new infor\u00adma\u00adtion.\u201d This means that it is no longer neces\u00adsary to take the fans apart and install new wires. The app from ebm-papst is avail\u00adable for all customers world\u00adwide.<\/p>\n

6,000 fewer metric tons of CO\u2082<\/h2>\n

After the plant in Asaa, another two local heating systems were set up by AEA, EVAPCO and ebm-papst in 2020. They are located in the villages Vig, with almost 3,000 inhab\u00adi\u00adtants, and H\u00f8jby, with 1,450 inhab\u00adi\u00adtants, in the north\u00adwest of the country. But the three compa\u00adnies are sure that this was just the begin\u00adning. In June 2020, the Danish govern\u00adment decided to completely phase out crude oil and natural gas as heat sources in the Chris\u00adtians\u00adborg climate agree\u00adment with the aim of reducing the country\u2019s CO\u2082 emis\u00adsions. It is increas\u00adingly relying on district heating.<\/p>\n

Today, district heating covers 60 percent of the final energy require\u00adment in Denmark. To compare, the figure is only 14 percent in Germany. Data from the Vig and H\u00f8jby plants show the posi\u00adtive effects that this is having on the climate. Together, they save around 6,000 metric tons of CO\u2082 per year compared to when natural gas was the heat source. In any case, the compa\u00adnies are ready to jump into action when any new orders come in. Tim Th\u00f8gersen sums up, \u201cNow we have a solid concept that we can reuse at any time. We just have to calcu\u00adlate how many energy absorbers the solu\u00adtion requires and we are ready to go.\u201d\u2002<\/p>\n

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DISTRICT HEATING MARKET IN EUROPE<\/h2>\n

<\/p>\n

Denmark comes after Iceland in second place in supplying its inhab\u00adi\u00adtants with district heating. (Graphic | Statista)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is a November morning in Asaa, a village in the north\u00adeast of Denmark. It is -5 degrees Celsius outside and a cold wind blows around the pedes\u00adtrians\u2019 ears. But, in a single-family home around the corner, it is nice and warm: the heating system provides a cozy warmth. Resi\u00addents in Asaa heat their homes [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,8,9],"tags":[205,167],"class_list":["post-15406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fans","category-heating","category-refrigeration-ventilation","tag-innovation","tag-sustainability"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15406"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15503,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15406\/revisions\/15503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mag.ebmpapst.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}