Discover RELaTED in its 1st newsletter

Editorial: “We need to adapt district heating systems to 21st century”

District heating systems span below our feet in many cities across Europe. These are complex systems, some of them conceived in the preceding generation, which still today are the cheapest, most reliable and environmentally friendly way to deliver heat to our cities. We want to take profit from existing networks, but at the same time, we need to adapt these to ensure their competitiveness in a changing environment in the 21^st Century. 

In this newsletter, you will learn about our RELaTED system. This system takes to profit from the continuous development of regulations and improvement in heat diffusion systems in buildings to reduce as much as possible distribution temperatures in the network, thus reducing distribution losses. At the same time, we are investing in developing building-integrated solar thermal systems that, connected to the network, deliver substantially larger amounts of heat with lower capital costs than traditional solar thermal systems. All this is possible thanks to a smart multifunctional substation concept and reversible heat pumps in the building, which together make a fantastic pack confront the integration of Nearly Zero Energy Buildings and Plus Energy Houses in our networks.

The RELaTED system takes to profit from the continuous development of regulations and improvement in heat diffusion systems in buildings to reduce as much as possible distribution temperatures in the network, thus reducing distribution losses.

On the generation side, RELaTED proposes the de-carbonization of heat production with the integration of industrial waste heat streams and other Renewable Energy Sources in the generation mix. Altogether, RELaTED proposes a fantastic pack of technologies aimed at a renewable heat supply to our cities. 

As Project Coordinator, I am proud of the 14-companies that have coordinated their interests, technologies and investment roadmaps to develop, deploy and test them. We have just initiated our project, there are still 36 months ahead. But there are already experimental activities under process and large scale interventions will be initiated in the next 12 months.

If you want to learn more about RELaTED, our technologies, partners and the DH networks where we will deploy it, please enjoy this newsletter. If you are even more curious, visit our website, or follow us through social media.