New project will demonstrate district heating and smart energy in 3 cities

Article published on the 4DH website

A new 5-year project will receive 28 million euro from Horizon 2020, EU’s research programme, to demonstrate smart zero carbon technologies in cities in Spain, Estonia and Denmark.

The three cities of Vitoria-Gasteiz in Spain, Tartu in Estonia and Sønderborg in Denmark will implement different initiatives within building retrofitting, integrated infrastructures (i.e. District Heating), sustainable mobility and ICT, which make sense in their local level.

A big part of the project will be to replicate and exploit the knowledge gained from these initiatives so that other cities can learn and make the same commitments. This will be achieved through a new Smart Cities Network.

In concrete district heating initiatives, all three cities will renovate a few hundred dwellings as well as install district heating technology. For example, Sønderborg will install a new high efficiency heat pump, Tartu will integrate heating and cooling in the district heating system through a new heat pump, while Vitoria-Gasteiz will develop a new district heating network based on biomass.

Deputy Head of 4DH and Professor in Energy Planning Brian Vad Mathiesen at Aalborg University, Denmark, is part of the project. He is looking forward to contribute with a focus on replicating and exploiting the knowledge from this project about planning cities with integrated renewable energy systems.

– With three cities so different in size and infrastructure there is a lot of potential for learning from each other, says Brian Vad Mathiesen.