Szczecin, Poland

The city of Szczecin

Szczecin is located on the river Oder and it is the administrative and industrial centre of West Pomeranian Voivodeship. Szczecin is a city of 401,907 inhabitants in north-western Poland. The city is, by population, the seventh largest in the country and the second largest port in Poland.

The demonstrator

The Szczecin demonstrator is based on a newly built low-temperature network, installed as part of a new development on Łasztownia, an island within the city. The grid consists of a 2-pipe system with warm and cold pipe that distributes thermal energy flows between neighbors. The warm pipe operates at 30-50 °C and the cold line operates at 25-35 °C.

The building connected to the grid will use internal low-temperature heating system supplied directly from the grid. Decentralized water-source heat pumps will supply domestic hot water and cooling machines will be used to cover comfort cooling demand.

Excess heat from industry and comfort cooling is also exploited. Energy will be only added to the system when needed by central balancing unit connected to high temperature DH grid. The central balancing unit can also expel excess heat.

Due to the low temperature of the grid, thermal losses will be reduced and it will be possible to implement renewable energy sources.

Steering system, by using algorithms and data about demands of users, will optimize flow and temperature in the network. It will also decide on the operation mode of central balancing unit.

Aims of the demonstrator are:

1. Creation of an island solution independent of existing DH network

2. Exploit local waste heat potential from industry

3. Creating the potential for the use of renewable energy sources

4. Implementation of smart control for operational optimization and a data mining