Methods for Large-Scale Monitoring of District Heating Systems Using Airborne Thermography

Abstract

District heating is a common way of providing heat to buildings in urban areas. The heat is carried by hot water or steam and distributed in a network of pipes from a central power plant. It is of great interest to minimize energy losses due to bad pipe insulation or leakages in such district heating networks. As the pipes generally are placed underground, it may be difficult to establish the presence and location of losses and leakages. Toward this end, this work presents methods for large-scale monitoring and detection of leakages by means of remote sensing using thermal cameras, so-called airborne thermography. The methods rely on the fact that underground losses in district heating systems lead to increased surface temperatures. The main contribution of this work is methods for automatic analysis of aerial thermal images to localize leaking district heating pipes. Results and experiences from large-scale leakage detection in several cities in Sweden and Norway are presented.