Abstract
A major contribution to our society’s environmental impact lies in meeting the energy needs of buildings, specifically in areas where the supply of such commodities is based on high carbon-emitting fossil fuels (oil/coal). This study analyses a mixed-use urban district situated in Kazakhstan. The district features a set of households together with three schools, a hospital, and several office buildings. The heating energy needs of the city are currently entirely met by coal-fired solutions; thus, this study wishes to investigate the feasibility of novel more sustainable technological approaches. A set of scenarios is modeled by means of the EnergyPLAN analysis tool where the technical feasibility of a district heating network is analyzed in combination with both greener fossil fired solutions and renewables.
Highlights
The path to decarbonization, which is a mandatory objective for our society [1], can have diverse approaches with regard to the energy supply of our communities
The switch towards such an energy supply system could be achieved with different technological solutions; within the present study, the attention is framed on the potential of using a renewable supply of energy in terms of electricity and/or biomass, coupled either with electricity-powered heat production devices such as heat pumps (HP) and/or biomass powered micro-CHP and thermal storage systems (TES)
The community is significantly more reliant on the grid as an asset in order to meet its own energy needs given the need to import and export electricity for approximately 46 GWh per year. This slightly gets better with the addition of a thermal storage system, as in Scenario 2, where the electricity imports and exports decrease to approximately 34 GWh, which is still significantly higher than the 12 GWh of the reference scenario
Summary
The path to decarbonization, which is a mandatory objective for our society [1], can have diverse approaches with regard to the energy supply of our communities. The goal of the study is to investigate the feasibility of an energy supply system entirely based on renewable energy sources towards an energy-wise selfsustaining community, investigating the potential role of storage technologies towards a 100% renewable energy system The switch towards such an energy supply system could be achieved with different technological solutions; within the present study, the attention is framed on the potential of using a renewable supply of energy in terms of electricity (by means of solar PV) and/or biomass, coupled either with electricity-powered heat production devices such as heat pumps (HP) and/or biomass powered micro-CHP (mCHP) and thermal storage systems (TES). Even considering the very low temperatures characterizing most of Kazakhstan heat pumps are still being considered as a valid asset to reach ambitious decarbonization targets with respect to the continuously growing district heating sector [11], mostly thanks to the cheap and easy installation with the existing building stock and the possibility of integrating large capacities of renewable electricity generation sources such as solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind
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