March 21, 2019

The International Solar Energy Society is very happy to host the IEA SHC Solar Academy's 2019 series.

This first webinar will share the latest results of IEA SHC Task 55 on Large Scale SHC Systems Integration into District Heating and Cooling Networks.

Solar District Heating (SDH) is in the early market development stage. Large solar thermal plants feeding into district heating networks represent only about 1% of the installed capacity of solar thermal systems, despite the fact that competitive prices lower than 40 €/MWh can be reached. In the long run, solar district heating could represent 4-15% of the total technical potential of solar thermal energy. 

The aim of this IEA SHC work is to develop technical and economic requirements for the commercial market introduction of solar district heating and cooling (DHC) for a broad range of countries. The activities aim to improve technological know-how, market know-how and understanding of the boundary conditions as well as to provide expert know-how for project initiation and implementation and for training. A key element will be the direct cooperation of SDH experts with associations and companies in the district heating sector as a means to bridge the gap between these sectors. 

The 90-minute webinar will include a 30 minutes Q/A session where attendees can submit their questions to the speakers.

The webinar is organized by the Solar Academy of the IEA SHC Programme and hosted by ISES, the International Solar Energy Society - the webinar presentations as well as the recording will be made available on both the IEA SHC and the ISES website after the webinar.

Webinar Recording

Speakers

Jianhua Fan

Bio: Jianhua Fan works as associate prof. in the Department of Civil Engineering, Technical University of Denmark. The focus areas of his research are solar heating systems and energy storages.

Speech: In the webinar presentation he will talk about solar heating plants and system integration of different renewables for example, solar heat, heat pump and biomass etc. Several application examples will be introduced.

Dr. Lucio Mesquita

Title: Drake Landing, a high solar fraction district heating system

Bio: Dr. Lucio Mesquita has over twenty years of experience and skills in the research, design, and testing of solar thermal products and systems for heating and cooling applications in industrial, commercial and residential markets in several countries including Canada, Brazil, China, and the United States. He has worked on the design and commissioning of more than 180 commercial solar thermal projects and is one of North America’s leading experts on solar cooling systems. He is currently focused on the performance analysis and improvements for the Drake Landing Solar Community and on the cost-reduction and optimization of large-scale renewable energy communities.

Speech: The Drake Landing Solar Community is a Canadian solar district heating system with seasonal thermal storage, which supply heat to 52 homes in Okotoks, Alberta. This demonstration project, designed to achieve over 90% solar fraction, was commissioned in the summer of 2007 and it is currently in its 12th year of operation. This presentation will describe the system design and its measured performance through out the years.

Jan-Erik Nielsen

Bio: Jan Erik Nielsen has long time experience in the field of Solar District Heating and was operating agent for Task 45 “Large Scale Solar Heating and Cooling Systems”. He is now subtask leader in Task 55. Jan Erik Nielsen is project engineer in PlanEnergi, a consulting company pioneer in the field of Renewable District Heating.

He has been engaged heavily in standards and certification matters too, as operating agent for Task 43 and 57 on solar standards and certification (2009 – 2018).  He was one of initiator of the Solar Keymark certification scheme in beginning of the century and worked as Solar Keymark Network Manager until 2018.  Jan Erik Nielsen is now working with the consulting company PlanEnergi, Denmark.

Speech: Seasonal storage of solar district heating.
Jan Erik Nielsen will present experiences from Danish large scale seasonal storages – including measured performance. It will be shown that it is possible to obtain very low store heat losses.

Dr. Karin Rühling

Bio: Dr.-Ing. Karin Rühling, Senior Researcher at the Institute of Power Engineering, Professorship of Building Energy Systems and Heat Supply of Technische Universität Dresden.

   - TU Dresden, Institute of Power Engineering, Dr.-Ing. degree (=Ph.D.) in 1986
   - Institute for Energy Supply until 1988 (geothermal energy, district heating)
   - ORGREB- Institute of Power Plants until 1991 (power plants)
   - since 1991 academic staff at TU Dresden
   - since 2010 - Department Manager for Heat Supply
   - since 2011 – Centre of energy Technology - Technical manager for complex R (Energy efficiency and Renewable Energy)

Speech: Dr.-Ing. Karin Rühling, Senior Researcher at the Institute of Power Engineering, Professorship of Building Energy Systems and Heat Supply of Technische Universität Dresden. She will present the method and some simulation results concerning decentralised feed in of solar thermal heat and heat from block heat and power plants into existing district heating systems.

Sabine Putz

Bio: Since 2009 Sabine Putz is head of the Research and Development department and since 2015 she is Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and member of the Management Board of SOLID. Sabine Putz is involved in numerous R&D projects on solar thermal heating and cooling at the national, European and international level. Sabine Putz represents the Operating Agent of IEA SHC TASK 55.

Speech: As Operating Agent of Task 55 Sabine Putz will shortly present the Task structure, the scope and the main objectives of Task 55.