The heat and cold networks reach 240 facilities in Spain

Biomass, through heat and cold networks fed with this renewable fuel, has been installed in many homes and neighborhood communities, which enjoy a clean and safe energy supply to cover their heating and domestic hot water needs.

This was reflected in the technical conference organized last June by the German Chamber of Commerce for Spain (AHK) at the headquarters of the PRAE (Environmental Resources Center) in Valladolid. The event, which brought together more than a hundred professionals from all over Spain, confirmed the sector's interest in the expansion of hot and cold networks powered by biomes and demonstrated the wide variety of equipment, services and technologies offered by German companies. in this field. The event included the participation of the German Ministry of Economy and Energy (BMWi), which detailed the good moment that the development of heat and cold networks is experiencing in the country, as well as the participation of the Spanish sectoral associations Avebiom (Spanish Association of Energy Recovery of Biomass) and Adhac (Association of Heat and Cold Network Companies).
 

Spain: sustained growth and great future potential
According to Adhac data, as of September 23, 2014, the total number of networks in Spain was 240, with 202 of them registered. Of the latter, 175 (86%) were heat networks, 9 (4%) were cold and 18 (10%) were heat and cold networks. These networks provided service to around 87,000 homes, while the kilometers covered by the tubes that made them up exceeded 300. In total, these collective air conditioning systems generate savings of 150,000 tons of CO2 per year.

The total installed power of the networks registered by Adhac amounts to 1,109 MW, of which 792 (71%) correspond to heating installations, while 317.4 (29%) are cold. Regarding the fuel used, 29.68% use fuel of renewable origin – mainly biomass – while natural gas is still the preferred fuel for these networks with a percentage of 48.71%. Regarding the profile of clients that use heat and cold networks in terms of power, 46.88% correspond to the tertiary sector, 33.08% to homes and the remaining 20.04% to the industrial sector.  

As Juan Jesús Ramós, head of the ONCB, highlighted at the Valladolid conference, the benefits of facilities that use biomass are evident, since they provide significant savings on energy bills thanks to lower fixed and variable operating costs; better energy rating (high efficiency) and better valuation of the property; greater availability of usable space thanks to the absence of own production equipment and chimneys; flexibility and adaptability to have greater power; permanent technological update; greater guarantee and security in the energy supply; and projection of the corporate image, generating a common feeling of shared responsibility.

Collective or centralized heating is located, logically, in large towns, and can reach percentages close to 17% in the most populous. This system, clearly more efficient and economical, is found in many buildings from the 70s and 80s of the last century where, first coal and later diesel, were the main fuels. These equipment are now obsolete and, in recent years, they are being replaced by others, which run on gas and biomass.

16 years since the first heat network in Spain
Since we have evidence of the first heat network, in 1999, in Cuéllar (Segovia), with 278 homes, to one of the last and most interesting in the Torrelago Urbanization in Laguna of Duero (Valladolid), with 1,488 homes, the road is not being easy. In the beginning it was necessary to overcome some logistical problem in the supply of biofuel or some blockage in the auger of the chip feeding system and, the most difficult thing, to combat the suspicions of some. Fortunately, the problems have been solved, generating greater and greater confidence among society in bioenergy, a renewable, sustainable, efficient, cheap and CO2 emissions-neutral energy.