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Solutions for biomass fuel market barriers and raw material availability - IEE/07/777/SI2.499477
Heating and cooling with
biomass – Summary report –
D6.1
Lukas Sulzbacher & Josef Rathbauer
FJ-BLT Wieselburg
Wieselburg, August 2011
1
Content Preface ................................................................................................................. 2
1 Executive summary ......................................................................................... 3
2 Introduction and purpose ................................................................................. 7
2.1 Aim of EUBIONET III WP6 .............................................................................. 7
2.2 Biomass for heating and cooling ..................................................................... 7
2.3 District heating and cooling in Europe ............................................................. 9
2.4 EU renewable energy policy ..........................................................................12
3 Investigation of statistical data Task 6.1 ...........................................................14
3.1 Data availability ..........................................................................................14
3.1.1 Eurostat ............................................................................................14
3.1.2 International Energy Agency ................................................................15
3.2 Initiatives to improve statistical data ..............................................................16
3.2.1 Energy consumptions in households .....................................................17
3.2.2 International activities ........................................................................17
3.2.3 National action on energy consumption in households .............................18
3.3 Conclusion ..................................................................................................20
4 Investigation of technical forms – Task 6.2 .......................................................21
4.1 Aim and methodology ..................................................................................21
4.2 Current state of biomass heating technology ...................................................21
4.2.1 Grate furnace combustion ...................................................................21
4.2.2 Fluidized bed combustion ....................................................................23
4.2.3 Pulverized fuel firing ...........................................................................24
4.2.4 Future developments ..........................................................................25
4.3 Current state of cooling with biomass .............................................................26
4.3.1 The absorption chillers ........................................................................27
4.3.2 Supply concepts for chilled water .........................................................28
4.4 Biomass boiler producer catalogue .................................................................30
4.5 Conclusions.................................................................................................35
5 Investigation of costs – Task 6.3 .....................................................................36
5.1 Aim and Methodology ...................................................................................36
5.2 List of Case studies ......................................................................................37
5.3 Results of the case studies ............................................................................41
6 List of references ...........................................................................................46
7 Appendix 1 – List of Case Studies ....................................................................47
8 Appendix 2 – List of Company fact sheets .........................................................49
2
Preface
This publication is part of the EUBIONET III Project (Solutions for biomass fuel market
barriers and raw material availability - IEE/07/777/SI2.499477, www.eubionet.net)
funded by the European Union‟s Intelligent Energy Program. EUBIONET III is coordinated
by VTT. Project partners are Danish Technological Institute, DTI(Denmark), Energy
Centre Bratislava, ECB (Slovakia), Ekodoma (Latvia), Fachagentur Nachwachsende
Rohstoffe e.V., FNR (Germany), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, SLU
(Sweden), Brno University of Technology, UPEI VUT (Czech), Norwegian University of Life
Sciences, UMB (Norway), Centre Wallon de Recherches Agronomiques, CRA-W (Belgium),
FJ-BLT Wieselburg (Austria), European Biomass Association, AEBIOM (Belgium), Centre
for Renewable Energy Sources, CRES (Greece), Utrecht University, UU (Netherlands),
University of Florence, UNIFI (Italy), Lithuanian Energy Institute, LEI (Lithuania),
Imperial College of Science, Imperial (UK), Centro da Biomassa para a Energia, CBE
(Portugal), Energy Restructuring Agency, ApE (Slovenia), Andalusian Energy Agency, AAE
(Spain). The EUBIONET III project runs from 2008 until 2011.
The main objective of the project is to increase the use of biomass based fuels in the EU
by finding ways to overcome the market barriers. The purpose is to promote international
trade of biomass fuels to help that demand and supply meet each other, while at the
same time the availability of industrial raw material is to be secured at reasonable prices.
The EUBIONET III project will in the long run boost sustainable, transparent international
biomass fuel trade, secure the most cost efficient and value-adding use of biomass for
energy and industry, boost the investments on best practice technologies and new
services on biomass heat sector and enhance sustainable and fair international trade of
biomass fuels.
This report is part of Work Package 6: Heating and cooling with biomass of the
EUBIONET III project. It includes a summary of the work of Task 6.1 Investigation of
sources of the fuels and comparison of heating and cooling systems, Task 6.2
Investigations of technical forms and Task 6.3 Investigation of costs. The summary of
the international workshop, which was organized within the frame of the Work Package 6
in Kaunas (Lithuania), could be found in the workshop summary report (D6.2) of WP6.
This summary report was written by Josef Rathbauer and Lukas Sulzbacher from the FJ-
BLT in Wieselburg. The results of Task 6.2 and Task 6.3 are also based on the work of
project partners. We would like to acknowledge the contributions by the WP 6
participating EUBIONET III project partners for their efforts to collect data for the case
studies and conduct interviews.
The sole responsibility for the content of this publication lies with the authors. It does not
necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Communities. The European Commission
is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.
3
1 Executive summary
Biomass is a very important energy source for heat production, especially for the
residential and service sector. One of the main reasons therefore is that it can easily be
transported, stored, traded and used with several applications at the time and place,
where heat is needed. The use of biomass fuels provides an incentive for the sustainable
management of local woodland, it adds to the local economy and the establishment of a
reliable supply chain.
To point out the role of heating and cooling with biomass in the European Union was a
major aim of EUBIONET III WP6. Therefore analyses of national and European statistical
data and the availability of data are described. To give an overview of the current market
and the technical possibilities, the state of the art of heating and cooling with biomass
was described and a catalogue of selected biomass boiler producers in the participating
countries was carried out.
A very important aim of WP 6 was to compare the costs of different heating systems.
Therefore case studies are provided, to show the costs, when a fossil heating system is
replaced by a biomass heating system. These case studies describe best practice
examples and give an overall picture of the different fossil- and biomass based heating
situations and cost-differences in European countries. The case studies include
calculations and comparisons of emissions in CO2 equivalents of the fossil and biomass
based heating system.
Currently approximately half of the final energy demand of EU 27 is used for heating and
in the year 2008 about 11.9 % of this energy demand was covered by renewable energy
sources. First surveys and estimations shows, that the EU 27 consumes about 55.1 Mtoe
of biomass for heating. Major consumers of this energy are the domestic and service
sector.
The actual developments in the biomass energy market are substantially influenced by
European regulations. The Energy and Climate change package and the so called 20-20-
20 targets, as well as the national implementation of the targets have effects on the
biomass heating and cooling sector. To monitor the ongoing developments and to meet
the targets of the EU directive in renewable energies and the National Action Plans,
detailed and reliable energy statistics are necessary.
Statistics on energy have so far been focused on energy supply and on fossil energies.
But in future, more focus is needed on increased knowledge and monitoring of final
energy consumption, renewable energy and nuclear energy.
The households´ energy consumption is a major indicator to monitor developments on
energy efficiency and green house gas emissions in the domestic sector. Investigations in
the line of this work package have shown that there are a few national activities on
biomass consumption of households, but detailed data on energy and biomass
consumption of households are rare. Comprehensive surveys on this topic on Member
States level are very obsolete. The national initiatives to collect data on energy
consumption of households are characterized through different definitions, indicators and
methodologies and make a comparison difficult. Especially the sectors households,
services and transport need improvements on data availability.
The current biomass furnace technology in Europe has already achieved a very high
state-of-the art. The most common biomass fuels for domestic heat production are wood
logs, wood chips and wood pellets. Especially for modern low-energy houses, wood
pellets in combination with grate furnace technology are used. Wood pellets and wood
logs boilers are available with capacities from 10 kW upwards, while wood chips boilers
4
are produced with capacities from 30 kW up to some MW. Therefore wood chips boilers
are used for buildings with higher heat demand and for district heating systems.
International political interests to limit emissions from small scale combustion sites are
increasing. Therefore in future further research and development activities to reduce
emissions from biomass boilers are needed. The development of small-scale
commercialized gasification systems is in its early stages, but the technology promises
higher efficiencies than it would have been possible by the direct combustion of the
biomass.
Depending on the political framework requirements of the respective country, there are
differences in technology and quality of the biomass boilers, especially concerning
emissions and safety. The demand for high quality biomass boilers is increasing. The
producers´ survey has shown, that Austrian and German boiler manufacturers are
exporting their products world-wide with a quota of export partly more than 80 %. The
results of the survey are summarized in a producer catalogue. The catalogue includes a
list of 59 selected biomass boiler manufacturers of the participating countries with
information on contact details, form and size of the company, number of employees and
turnover, market share and sold units and a short description of their products.
Cooling with biomass is currently limited to centralized district solutions. The main
market for district cooling is the service sector, followed by the food and mining industry.
The residential sector is characterized by a low demand for biomass and district cooling
at present. Domestic decentralized cooling systems are based on air condition produced
by electrically operated compressor chillers or solar power. The cooling market is
currently dominated by air conditioning systems powered by electricity and the demand
of electricity used for cooling is estimated with more than 260 TWh in Europe.
Cost reduction is still the most relevant factor, by which consumer come to a decision for
a heating system. Based on actual market prices for boilers and fuels a comparison
between the use of fossil and biomass fuels were carried out in form of case studies. The
main focus of the case studies was the cost comparison of fossil and biomass fuels
including investments and fuel costs. In total 32 case studies with 59 different heating
systems were carried out. These heating systems are fired with 18 different fuel types,
10 biomass fuels, 6 different fossil fuels and fuel combinations.
Wood pellet boilers are the most frequent calculated biomass fuel systems in the case
studies. 18 case studies deal with wood pellets. The boiler capacity ranges from 8 kW up
to 1 MW, but mostly used in residential buildings with a capacity from 8 kW to 75 kW.
The second most commonly biomass fuel in the case studies was wood chips with 12
different heating system examples. The capacities of the boiler range from 120 kW up to
3.3 MW and was typically calculated in case studies of large buildings with a high heat
demand. Log wood heating systems were analyzed of 8 case studies. Their capacities
range from 15 kW up to 225 kW.
The investment costs are depending on the used technology and the fuels. The cheapest
systems for heating with biomass are log wood boilers. The lowest investment costs for
fossil fueled heating systems are reported for gas boilers, connected to the gas grid and
electric heaters.
Beside the economical aspects ecological effects of different heating systems have been
analyzed. Therefore the CO2 equivalent emissions were calculated and the savings were
pointed out when a fossil fuel based heating system is changed by a biomass heating
system. The emissions of the respective heating systems were calculated with the life-
cycle-analyzing software GEMIS. The following graph shows the specific reduction of CO2-
equivalent emissions in kilogram per MWh heat output. The partly large variations are
due to different boiler capacities, technologies and heat demands.
5
Figure 1: Specific reduction of CO2-equivalent emissions in kg per MWh heat output.
Source: FJ-BLT
The reduction potential of a biomass heating system depends on the type of fossil fueled
heating system which it is compared to. The average CO2-equivalents-reduction for all
described biomass fuels range from 330 kg/MWh to 410 kg/MWh. If all case studies are
realized and the fossil based heating systems are replaced by the described biomass
systems, total emissions of 19,016 tones CO2- equivalent emissions can be saved yearly.
Conclusion and recommendations:
The statistical data on biomass consumption for heating or cooling especially in
households are rare and old. For an effective energy policy and to check developments
and expected impacts of energy efficiency measures, a regular data collection is very
important. There are a lot of ongoing activities to improve the data availability on
European Member States level, but currently not available.
Cooling with biomass is currently competing with air conditioning systems powered by
electricity. Decentralized systems for cooling with biomass are at present not marketable
and competitive.
The fuels costs are the factor with the highest influences on the total costs. Even the
investment costs of fossil fueled boilers are cheaper than for biomass boilers, the specific
total costs of biomass fueled variants are in nearly all cases lower.
Regarding to emissions, biomass fuels and fossil fuels based heating systems show a
clear difference. Depending on the type of fuel and boiler, the potential of emission
reduction (CO2-equivalents) ranges from 90 % up to 98 %. Regarding emissions, it is
always worth to replace a fossil based heating system by biomass.
The use of biomass for heat production has a huge potential to reduce emissions
especially in the non ETS (EU Emissions Trading System) sectors, such as agriculture,
transport, residential and some industry. As the case studies have shown the economic
aspects are depending on the development of fuel prices. With an increasing price for
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fossil fuels in future, biomass based heating and even cooling systems will become more
competitive.
Currently government support schemes play a decisive role. Some countries offer grants
for activities to improve the energy efficiency of buildings and for investments on
biomass based heating systems. These financial support schemes help to close the gap of
investment costs between fossil and biomass based heating systems, so that an
economic benefit arise beside the ecological advantage of biomass heating.
The increasing use of biomass could also raise the problem of scarcity of raw materials.
Especially woody biomass is also in great demand for a number of material utilizations
such as the wood particle board and paper industry. A future challenge would be to
acquire unused woody biomass resources and agricultural residues for energy production
as well as for material utilization.
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2 Introduction and purpose
Work package (WP) 6 of the EUBIONET III project is dealing with the potential and the
aspects of biomass use for heating and cooling. The following chapter of this summary
report is introducing the topic of the WP and gives an overview, which aims and
objectives are pursued in the line of WP6.
2.1 Aim of EUBIONET III WP6
The overall aim of the work package is to describe the role of heating and cooling with
biomass in the European Union. Due to analyses of national and European statistical
data, the current status of heating and cooling with biomass and the availability of data is
pointed out. Based on these analyses and on results of other projects recommendations
are derived.
Another aim of the WP is to give an overview of the technical possibilities and the state of
the art of heating and cooling with biomass. A description of the major producers for
small scale heating technology should give a picture of the market. The most important
manufacturers of biomass boilers in the respective countries of the project partners are
presented with a short description of their company and products in a producer
catalogue.
A very important aim of the work package 6 is to compare the costs of different heating
systems. Therefore case studies are provided, to show the costs, when a fossil heating
system is replaced by a biomass heating system. These case studies describe best
practice examples and give an overall picture of the different heating situations and cost-
differences between fossil and biomass fuels in European countries.
A major topic of the case studies is the emissions of the different heating systems and
the reduction potential of biomass fuels. The case studies include calculations of
emissions in CO2 equivalents and the reduction, when the fossil based heating system is
replaced by a biomass heating system.
2.2 Biomass for heating and cooling
The use of biomass for heat production in Europe is getting more and more important
and the share of bioenergy made of biomass within the renewables is increasing. One of
the main reasons therefore is that it can easily be transported, stored, traded and used
with several applications at the time and place, where energy is needed.
Approximately half of the total final energy demand of EU 27 is used for heating. In the
year 2008 about 11.9 % of the energy demand for heating was covered by renewable
energy sources. Of the 564.7 Mtoe total energy consumption for heating, nearly 67.8
Mtoe was produced by renewable energy. The EU 27 consumes about 55.1 Mtoe of
biomass for heating, including wood, wood waste and renewable municipal wastes. These
data are based on the results of “SHARES”, an initiative of Eurostat and Member States
to improve statistical data.
The shares of biomass use for heat production in EU 27 countries are varying. Countries
like Sweden, Finland, Austria, Germany or Latvia have a high share of biomass use for
heat production, because of the traditional use of wood fuels in households and
8
industries. While in other countries like United Kingdom or Ireland, the share of biomass
for heat is slightly increasing the last years [Roubanis et al. 2010].
There is a multitude of applications to change biomass to energy. Heat appliances range
from small scale stoves for room heating, to boilers of a few kW and multi MW boilers for
industry and centralized district heating. Especially the use of woody biomass for
centralized heat production observed a considerable increase within the last 20 years, as
Figure 2 shows below.
Figure 2: Heat derived of biomass in EU-271
Source: EUROSTAT
The development of direct use of wood for heat production was characterized by a light
increasing over the last 20 years. But in comparison with other renewable, like solar heat
and biogas with about 1100 ktoe or liquid biofuels with nearly 580 ktoe, woody biomass
is still the most important energy source for heat production in European countries.
Figure 3: energy consumption of wood for heat production in EU-272
Source: EUROSTAT
The bioenergy balance sheet from Eurostat is showing that households and services as
well as industry are the major energy consumer of biomass. In 2008, the EU was
consuming nearly 98 Mtoe of biomass. As the graph below shows, nearly 1/3 is used for
electricity, combined heat and power plants (CHP) and DH. The rest is used in
households, commercial and industrial sector, mainly for heating purposes (Figure 4).
1 Roubanis et al.: Renewable energy statistics, Eurostat, statistics in focus 56/2010
2 Roubanis et al.: Renewable energy statictics, Eurostat, statistics in focus 56/2010
9
Figure 4: energy consumption of biomass for heat production in EU-27
Source: Renewable heating & cooling (RHC) European technology Platform, EUROSTAT
The biomass production is a decentralized market and includes a large potential for rural
development. Beside this fact, it could help to reduce energy demand from imported
fossil resources. The use of biomass for heating purpose replaces fossil fuels and
therefore reduces greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The reduction potential could mainly
be realized in non ETS (Emission Trading Scheme) sectors, where mandatory targets are
not so easy to enforce. The non ETS are the households, service and transport sectors.
2.3 District heating and cooling in Europe
The actual developments in the district heating and cooling sector are major influenced
by European regulations. The Energy and Climate change package and the so called 20-
20-20 targets, as well as the national implementation of the targets have effects on the
district heating and cooling sector.
The following chapter gives an overview, how the district heating and cooling sector has
developed and which data are available.
Since 1999 Euroheat & Power is publishing every two years the “District Heating and
Cooling Country by Country Survey”. In this report, detailed data about district heating
and cooling of 29 participating countries are included.
Heating:
New connections to district heating networks and an enlargement of the floor space
served by district heating could be observed in every participating country.
10
The following Figure 5 shows the shares of district heating used to satisfy heat demand in
the residential and services and other sectors.
Figure 5: Share of district heating of all sectors.3
Source: Euroheat&Power
The shares of district heating used to satisfy heat demand in the residential and services
and other sectors range from 93.9% in Iceland, where the main part of the district heat
is produced by geothermal energy sources, to 2.8% in Switzerland. In Switzerland, the
figure includes, as distinguished from other countries in this survey, only the share of the
residential sector.
Figure 6: Total installed district heating capacity in MWth.4
Source: Euroheat&Power
Figure 6 shows the total installed district heating capacity in MWth. The capacities range
from 621,000 MWth in Poland, where nearly 49% of the energy produced by coal and
1,400 MWth in Norway.
The main fuels used to generate district heat in the Euroheat&Power participating
countries are natural gas, coal and coal products and renewables (no further specification
is given). The graph (Figure7) below shows the variations in the fuels used for production
of district heat.
3 Euroheat&Power: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009 4 Euroheat&Power: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009
11
Figure 7: Fuel mix used to produce district heat.5
Source: Euroheat&Power
Cooling:
District cooling was not very important in the past years. The public interest therefore
grew with the demand for comfort cooling. The main market for district cooling is the
service sector, followed by the food and mining industry. The residential sector is
characterized by a low demand for district cooling at present. The main advantage is to
use fuel free cooling sources and it makes the use of free and natural cooling possible. A
district cooling system could reach 5 to 10 times higher efficiencies than common
electricity-driven chillers.
Figure8: European district cooling capacity in MWth.6
Source: Euroheat&Power
5 Euroheat&Power: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009 6 Euroheat&Power: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009
12
The installed district cooling capacity increased over the last years not only within
European countries. France has with 620 MW, the largest installed capacity for district
cooling in Europe. Approximately 3% of thereof is produced by Renewable energies.
Especially in Nordic countries like Finland and Sweden, the total installed capacity of
district cooling was multiplied within the last years.
The Figure 9 shows the district cooling production in TJ within Europe.
Figure 9: European district cooling production in TJ. 7
Source: Euroheat&Power
The demand for cooling is steadily increasing in Southern as well as in Northern
countries. The cooling market is currently dominated by air conditioning systems
powered by electricity. The demand of electricity used for cooling is estimated with more
than 260 TWh in Europe.
Euroheat&Power also uses the collective term “Renewables” without any further
specification for biomass or geothermal energy sources for their analyses. Further data
availability is limited to participating countries and so data are not available for all
European countries. Because of lack of information and the different setup of statistical
data throughout Europe, calculations are hard to establish according to Euroheat&Power.
2.4 EU renewable energy policy
European leaders signed up to a binding EU-wide target to source 20% of their energy
needs from renewables, including biomass, hydro, wind and solar power, by 2020. To
meet this objective, they also agreed on a directive to promote renewable energies,
which set individual targets for each member state.
Renewable energies such as wind power, solar energy, hydropower and biomass can play
a major role in the challenge of energy security and global warming because they do not
deplete and produce less greenhouse-gas emissions than fossil fuels.
Since the energy crises of the 1970s, several industrial nations have launched programs
to develop renewable energy solutions, but the return of low oil prices prevented
renewable energies from picking up on a large commercial scale.
7 Euroheat&Power: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009
13
In 2007, renewable energies covered 13.1% of global primary energy supply and 17.9%
of global electricity production [IEA, 2007]. The IEA's 2006 World Energy Outlook
foresees in its Alternative Policy Scenario that the share of renewables in global energy
consumption will only slightly increase by 2030, at 14%. Renewables in electricity
generation are expected to grow to around 25%, according to the IEA.8
The European Commission published a White Paper in 1997 setting out a Community
strategy for achieving a 12% share of renewables in the EU's energy mix.
The decision was motivated by concerns about security of supply and environmental
protection. Directives were adopted in the electricity and transport sectors that set
national sectoral targets.
The 12% target was adopted in a 2001 directive on the promotion of electricity from
renewable energy sources, which also included a 22.1% target for electricity for the EU-
15. The legislation was an important part of the EU's measures to deliver on
commitments made under the Kyoto Protocol.
More recently, the Community has agreed targets for 2020. The 2005 share (measured
in terms of gross final energy consumption) was 8.5% (9.2% in 2006), and the EU 2020
target is 20%. This target was content of the “Climate and Energy package”, which was
agreed by the European Parliament and Council in 2008. The “Climate and Energy
package”–targets, also called 20-20 20-targets comprise the following contents:
A reduction in EU greenhouse gas emissions of at least 20% below 1990 levels
20% of EU energy consumption to come from renewable resources
A 20% reduction in primary energy use compared with projected levels, to be
achieved by improving energy efficiency.
The EU directive on renewable energies, agreed in December 2008, requires each
member state to increase its share of renewable energies in the bloc's energy mix to
raise the overall share to 20% by 2020. A 10% share of 'green fuels' in transport is also
included within the overall EU target.
The directive legally obliges each EU Member State to ensure that its 2020 target is met
and to outline the appropriate measures it will take do so in a National Renewable Energy
Action Plan (NREAP) to be submitted by 30 June 2010 to the European Commission. The
European Commission will be able to initiate infringement proceedings if a Member State
fails to introduce appropriate measures to enable it to meet its interim trajectory.
The National Action Plans (NREAPs) will set out how each EU country will meet its overall
national target, including elements such as sectoral targets for shares of renewable
energy for transport, electricity and heating/cooling and how they will tackle
administrative and grid barriers.9
8 Renewables in global energy supply. An IEA fact sheet, 2007 9 EU renewable energy policy. http://www.euractiv.com/en/energy/eu-renewable-energy-policy-linksdossier-188269. 08.03.2011
14
3 Investigation of statistical data Task 6.1
To monitor the ongoing developments and to meet the targets of the EU directive in
renewable energies and the National Action Plans, detailed and reliable energy statistics
are necessary. Therefore the Regulation (EC) No 1099/2008 of the European Parliament
and of the Council of 22 October 2008 on energy statistics was published. The regulation
was created to meet the demand of precise and timely data on energy quantities, their
forms, sources, generation, supply, transformation and consumption.
Statistics on energy have so far been focused on energy supply and on fossil energies.
But in future, more focus is needed on increased knowledge and monitoring of final
energy consumption, renewable energy and nuclear energy.
The availability of accurate, up-to-date information on energy is essential for assessing
the impact of energy consumption on the environment and for monitoring of the
greenhouse gas emissions.
There are a few organizations, which provide energy statistics on European level. In the
following, the two major organizations and the data availability is presented.
3.1 Data availability
3.1.1 Eurostat
The statistical data for EU countries are provided by the Eurostat. It is the Statistical
Office of the European Communities and provides the European Union with statistical
information. Therefore, it gathers and analyses figures from the national statistical offices
across Europe and provides comparable and harmonized data for the European Union for
usage in the definition, implementation and analysis of Community policies.
Eurostat has set up with the members of the „European statistical system‟ (ESS) a
network of user support centers which exist in nearly all Member States as well as in
some EFTA countries. Their mission is to provide help and guidance to Internet users of
European statistical data.
Eurostat and Member States developed together a common statistical system for the
regular collection of the data. The energy statistics system is currently based essentially
on voluntary agreements with the Member States. Annual and monthly statistics are
collected via questionnaires sent to Eurostat by the competent National Statistical
Authorities (NSI, Ministries, Energy Agencies). Currently there are following data
available:
Quantities:
Annual data Monthly data
Coal Coal
Electricity Electricity
Natural gas Natural gas
Oil Oil
Nuclear Power Nuclear Power
Renewables
Liquid Biofuels
Prices:
Gas and electricity prices according to the new methodology
Bi-annual
15
Industrial and domestic consumers
Competition indicators
Policy relevant indicators:
Share of CHP (Directive 2004/8/EC)
Share of renewable electricity (Directive 2001/77/EC)
Share of renewable energy and biofuels
Export and imports:
Annual data Monthly data
Coal Coal
Electricity Electricity
Natural gas Natural gas
Oil Oil
Eurostat definition for the collective term Renewable Energy is as follows:
“Renewable energy sources include renewable non-fossil energy sources such as
wind, solar, geothermal, hydro-power and energy from biomass/wastes. The latter
refers to electricity generated from the combustion of wood and wood wastes,
other solid wastes of a renewable nature (for example, straw), biogas (including
landfill, sewage, and farm gas) and liquid biofuels, and from municipal solid waste
incineration.”
There are no data available for single renewable energy sources like biomass, solar or
hydro power in the current database. The final energy consumption is reported for the
sectors industry, transport und households, without any specification of the purpose like
heating, cooling and lightning.
3.1.2 International Energy Agency
The International Energy Agency (IEA) is an autonomous body which was established in
November 1974 within the framework of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) to implement an international energy program.
It carries out a comprehensive program of energy co-operation among twenty-six of the
OECD thirty member countries.
The basic aims of the IEA are:
To maintain and improve systems for coping with oil supply disruptions.
To promote rational energy policies in a global context through co-operative
relations with nonmember countries, industry and international organizations.
To operate a permanent information system on the international oil market.
To improve the world‟s energy supply and demand structure by developing
alternative energy sources and increasing the efficiency of energy use.
To promote international collaboration on energy technology.
To assist in the integration of environmental and energy policies.
IEA offers a broad database on energy statistics including data for OECD member
countries and countries beyond the OECD partly for free and in detail for sale. The
following sources of energy are included in the database:
Coal and Peat
Combustible Renewables and Waste
Crude Oil
Electricity
Gas
Geothermal, Solar, etc.
Heat
16
Hydro
Nuclear
Oil Products
Further the data are available for the following categories of final consumption:
Agriculture/Forestry
Commercial and Public Services
Fishing
Industry
Non-Energy Use
Non-Specified
Other
Petrochemical Feedstock
Transport
The category “Renewables and waste” includes single data for municipal waste, industrial
waste, primary solid biomass, biogas, liquid biofuels, geothermal, solar thermal, hydro,
solar photovoltaic, tide-wave-ocean and wind. The IEA database includes how much of
these energy sources are used for gross electricity generation and how much for gross
heat generation.
3.2 Initiatives to improve statistical data
With respond to statistical development requirements of the Energy Statistics Regulation,
in particular to review the methodology used to generate renewable energy statistics in
order to make available additional, pertinent, detailed statistics on each renewable
energy source a Working Party on “Renewable Energy Statistics” and a Working Group on
this topic was founded in 2007.
The objectives are to evaluate renewable energy data quality and define improvement
actions at Member State level. Further to improve and complement data collection and
reporting methodology to cover the full spectrum of renewable energy sources in a cost
effective way. It is also an aim to establish and implement a plan of actions for the next
years to improve the quality of the renewable energy statistics and modify accordingly
the Energy Statistics Regulation and the Joint Eurostat/IEA/UNECE questionnaire.10
Eurostat developed a tool called “SHARES”, where Member Sates provide the renewable
energy indicators. Based on the results of SHARES, Eurostat published for the first time
estimates of the RE indicators in a “Data in Focus” publication in July 2010. In November
2010, Eurostat published an extensive “Statistics in Focus” publication on renewable
energy including indicators and a short analysis based on SHARES results and other
renewable energy statistics. Some of these results are summarized in chapter 1.2 and
1.3 of this report.11
One of the main conclusions of the Working Party on “Renewable Energy Statistics” is to
improve the biomass trade data on pellets and liquid biofuels. Further there is a need for
biomass consumption surveys particularly in households and services. In addition it is
important to have more accurate estimates on heat produced by solar solar thermal and
there is a need to introduce the concept of thermal capacity in the collected data.
Ambient heat captured with heat pumps should be included in the statistics. It was
10
Roubanis, Nikolaos: The current statistical system for Renewable Energy.
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/statistics_30112007&vm=detailed&sb=Title 11 Ibid.
17
agreed to pursue the launching of biomass surveys in households and therefore support
Member States in surveying biomass consumption in households.12
3.2.1 Energy consumptions in households
The residential sector is one of the largest users of energy especially energy for heat
production. Energy consumption has direct and indirect environmental effects, which
depends on the energy source used and the amount. The households´ energy
consumption is a major indicator to monitor developments on energy efficiency and
green house gas emissions in the domestic sector. The present international statistical
databases are characterized by rare availability on this topic. There are several national
initiatives to collect data on energy consumption of households with different definitions,
indicators and methodologies, which make a comparison difficult. Especially the sectors
households, services and transport need improvements on data availability.
The following part gives a short overview about past and ongoing activities to improve
the statistical data on energy consumption in households.
3.2.2 International activities
The first international survey on energy consumption of households was published in
1999. It was done by Eurostat and a number of Member States and is so far the only
published international survey in the area of energy consumption in households. The data
collection work was for the reference years 1988 and 1995. From 1988 to 1995 the data
collection comprehends all Member States except for Italy. The data for this work have
been published in report “Energy consumption in Households”. The Member States were
responsible for the methods of obtaining the national studies or surveys and therefore
the study includes variations. The publication contains indicators of the data collection
methods for each country.
In 1996 a similar survey with the title “Central and Eastern European Countries” was
done. The survey was carried out with a large sample in Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech
Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, the Slovak Republic and
Slovenia. Also in this study the methodology varied from country to country.
Both survey covered topics on dwelling, space and water heating, cooking equipment,
electrical appliances, private cars and consumption and cost by type of fuel. 13
To improve the data availability a Task Force "Final Energy Consumption in Households"
and a Workgroup on this topic was initialized in 2008. The Task Force set up a review of
national approaches to establish the needs, user requirements and the scope of a survey
on Energy consumption in households. The results of the Task Force defined as “must
have” needs for a survey are:14
Consumption (electricity, gas, solid fuel, oil) per household
Consumption attributed to end-use, e.g. heating, lighting, large appliances, small
appliances
Data on penetration of EE technologies
Data on characteristics of the housing stock
Unit/specific consumption data
12 Roubanis, Nikolaos: Overview of the work of the Renewable Energy Statistics Working Party.
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/statistics_30112007&vm=detailed&sb=Title 13 Review of past work on Energy consumption in households, http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=detailed&sb=Title 14 Energy Consumption in Households – Progress Report. WG 2009. http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=detailed&sb=Title
18
Corresponding activity data, e.g. household numbers
The Task Force reviewed the following needs, which would be nice to have in term of a
survey on energy consumption in households:
Appliances stock & usage information (not just sales)
Trends in energy service demand, e.g. internal temperatures
The needs for data collection on “Renewables” are according to the results of the Task
Force:
Solar energy (collectors, photo-voltaic panels)
Biomass, in particular non-commercialized firewood
Use of heat pumps
A new grant was planned with start 2009/2010 and the actions will run until 2011. It is
important to secure a high convergence of survey coverage between the identified needs
and the existing national initiatives considered by the Task Force. In year 2009 13
Member States participated. Eurostat has foreseen funding possibilities for participation.
In particular, Eurostat invest subventions in Member States where survey in the area of
energy consumption in households are in need of development, have not been done yet
or have not done recently. The data collection is organized through surveys, modeling,
combined several sources and direct measuring. 15
3.2.3 National action on energy consumption in households
On national level, there are several initiatives to collect data on the energy consumption
in households. Most of them are characterized through different methodologies,
indicators and reference years. The Task Force “Final Energy Consumption in
Households” has dedicated which surveys are carried out on this topic in the Member
States.
Spain, Ireland, Slovenia, Netherlands and Belgium are doing annual surveys on
households. Austria and Germany organizes data collections every two years and France
as well as Latvia every three years.
Austria, Denmark, Finland, Spain, Hungary, Ireland, Netherland, Poland and Belgium are
also carrying out ad-hoc surveys or addressing specific issues (for example on
firewood,…). But also population census, household budget surveys or surveys of supplier
are used to collect data on the energy consumption in households. The following list is
showing the systematic use of modeling selective indicators for energy consumption in
households:
15 Energy Consumption in Households – Progress Report. WG 2009. http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=detailed&sb=Title
19
The national biomass statistics system in Member States16
Country Survey availability/planning Estimation methods
Bulgaria Use of the household budget for energy
consumption
Czech Republic Household surveys in 1997, 2004 and
2009
Estimates for intermediates
years households‟
consumption with modeling
(degree days, fuels prices…)
Denmark Bi-annual surveys of final consumption,
firewood and pellets, straw, wood chips
(through knowledge centers)
Germany Surveys of households 2001, 2003,
2005
Estonia Use of the household budget for energy
consumption
Ireland Expert estimations of non-
commercialized household
wood
Cyprus Inclusion of biomass questions in
existing surveys
Supply data from forestry
and trade declarations.
Latvia Regular surveys of households
(1991,2001,2007)
Use of extrapolations based
on 2001 households survey.
From 2004 onwards fixed
consumption level.
Lithuania Fuel questions in industry and
agriculture surveys, 1996 survey on
households. Planed households survey
for 2010 (sample size 10 000
households)
Household and service wood
estimates based on forestry
and wood sales
Hungary Last household survey in 1996
Netherlands Household surveys in 2001,
2005/2006, household surveys on
wood stoves
Modeling based on stove
capacity, average load
factors and efficiencies
Austria Household surveys every 2 years
(public sector every 5 years)
Intermediary space heating
with temperature correction
Portugal Use of the old survey of households,
intention to make survey in households
in collaboration with EU project
Romania Use of the household budget survey for
energy consumption
Slovenia Survey in households 1996, 2002
Finland Use of an inquiry on wood for space
heating
Modeling for space heating
consumption based on
building stock survey
Sweden Survey in households in 2001, survey
on firewood, wood chips, pellets and
briquettes in households sector
United Kingdom detailed household consumption
breakdown by fuel and use
16 Roubanis, Nikos: Final Energy Consumption in Households. Requirements on Renewables. http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=detailed&sb=Title
20
3.3 Conclusion
The data availability for Renewable Heating and Cooling market is generally limited due
to factors like decentralized heat generation facilities and the associated problems of
measurement. Taking bioenergy as an example, due to the wide dispersion of large and
small scale burners and boilers, it is not easy to ascertain the total installed heat
capacity, even though the name-plates on the appliances usually provide such
information. Even more difficult is assessing for how long each boiler is actually
operational when providing useful heat and whether it is working at full capacity or not.
Whether a burner or boiler is operated for 10, 100, or 8 000 hours a year can only be
found from a detailed survey of users since, unlike electricity or transport fuels, metering
of the heat output rarely occurs. Except in the case of district heating, there is little
commercial trade in heat. For heat from solar and geothermal sources, the IEA Solar
Heating and Cooling (SHC) and Geothermal implementing agreements have collected
data based on an assessment of installed capacity for several IEA and non-IEA countries.
Available data for commercially distributed biomass heat are included in IEA statistics but
these are far from complete.17
The variety of biomass resources are widely distributed so many of the data on heat
applications are very uncertain. Biomass used in individual buildings for water heating
and space heating is difficult to obtain and typically not covered in national statistics. It is
therefore nearly impossible to estimate the total value of biomass used for heating.
The contribution of renewables can only be assessed within the methodological
framework of the overall energy balance. Definitions and accountancy methodology for
renewables must be coherent with the accountancy of other energy sources. Statistics
need to keep track of the fast-moving and rapidly evolving technologies of the RE
market.18
Further the dedicated surveys on energy and biomass consumption for heating or cooling
in households are rare and old. They were characterized through low response rates and
reporting inaccuracies. In previous surveys participating countries are responsible for the
methods of obtaining the national studies or surveys and therefore the study includes
variations. Therefore there is a need to implement actions improving national statistical
systems. Data availability by end-use need to be consolidated and enhanced so as to
better understand the trends observed and measured the energy savings on a yearly
basis as required by the Directive.
For an effective energy policy it is important to provide the Commission and other users
with high quality statistical services and products. To forecast or to check developments
and excepted impacts of energy efficiency measures, a regular data collection is very
important. There are a lot of activities in progress to improve the data material, but not
available at this time.
17 IEA – Renewables for heating and Cooling. Untapped Potential. Paris 2007 18 Roubanis, Nikolaos: The current statistical system for Renewable Energy. http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/statistics_30112007&vm=detailed&sb=Title
21
4 Investigation of technical forms – Task 6.2
Using biomass as fuels in modern efficient heating systems is a well-established
technique used for individual buildings and district heating. There are a number of
European standards that cover both the design of biomass systems and the specification
of the fuels, to secure a certain amount of quality and safety in operation and a minimum
of emissions.
4.1 Aim and methodology
The aim of Task 6.2 “Investigation of technical forms” was to give an overview of the
state of the art of biomass heating and cooling technology. Therefore the main
developments of the last years are described in the first part of this chapter. This
description includes technologies for heating and cooling with biomass as well as short
summaries of advantages and disadvantages of the technology.
To describe the actual biomass boiler market, the most important manufacturers of
biomass boilers in the respective countries of the project partners are presented. Each
project partner had to provide at least 3 company descriptions. The represented
manufacturers were selected by each project partner. Focus of the survey was on small-
scale boiler producers.
The company fact sheets includes information on contact details, form and size of the
company, number of employees and turnover, market share and sold units and a short
description of their products. This chapter includes a summary table of all 56 company
fact sheets. Detailed information can be found in the respective company fact sheet in
the annex. The catalogue should help consumers to find a boiler producer in their country
and should help to link to further information of the companies. In addition it gives the
boiler producer the possibility to present their company on an international platform.
4.2 Current state of biomass heating technology
There are three main combustion technologies, the grate furnace combustion, fluidized
bed combustion and the pulverized fuel firing system. The choice for the accurate
combustion technology depends on the type of used fuel and the size of the plant.
4.2.1 Grate furnace combustion
Grate furnace combustion is a widely used conversion method to produce heat and power
from biomass. It is typically used for applications with a nominal thermal capacity of
roughly 10 kW to 100 MW. Grate furnaces can be used with a wide range of biomass fuel
types and are flexible regarding fuel size and moisture content.
The combustion process in a grate furnace is divided into two steps. In the first step, the
solid fuel is gasified by an airflow supplied at the bottom of the fuel layer. The air flows
through the void space between the fuel particles constituting the fuel layer. The layer is
ignited by the hot gases above at the entrance of the furnace. In the second step,
burnout of the gases takes place. This is a purely homogeneous process that takes place
in the other parts of the furnace. When the combustion process is finished, the gases
release their heat to a heat exchanger.
22
Different types of grate furnaces exist, because the furnaces are optimized for various
fuels and operating conditions. In particular, different types of grates can be found. A
traveling grate consists of an endless band transporting the fuel through the furnace with
minimal disturbance of the fuel layer. A moving grate pushes the fuel over the grate by
bars moving relative to each other, which also causes local mixing of the fuel layer. Other
types of grates are fixed grates, inclined grates and vibrating grates.
Grate furnace combustion gives rise to emissions. One of these emissions consists of
considerable amounts of NOx. The NOx emissions are caused by oxidation of nitrogen
present in the solid fuel, because due to the relatively low temperatures in the furnace. A
technique implemented in grate furnaces to limit the emissions of NOx is staged
combustion. This involves the division of the combustion chamber in a secondary and a
primary combustion zone with own supply of air. The primary combustion zone is kept at
fuel rich conditions. This has the result that in the primary combustion zone, a
considerable part of the fuel-N, i.e. fuel nitrogen, is released as N2. Due to the low
temperatures in the furnace, further conversion into NOx is prevented. Therefore, this
limits the formation of NOx. In the secondary zone, burnout of the gases coming from the
primary zone takes place. The combustion process in the secondary zone is oxygen rich
to ensure complete burnout of the gases.19
Figure 10 is showing a schematic view of rate furnace boiler with a moving grate.
Figure 10: Grate furnace boiler.
Source: Binder GmbH
It can be concluded that grate furnace combustion is a mature combustion technique for
which already a range of techniques are available to optimize it for specific types of fuels,
good burnout of the exhaust gases and low NOx-emissions. It is mainly used for woody
biomass like wood chips and pellets, but also for straw and other biomass. Most of the
boilers used for domestic heating systems are based on the grate furnace technology.
Compared to fluidized bed combustion, the grate furnace combustion is not as prone to
ash agglomeration and slagging. It is characterized through a lower dust loading in the
flue gas. Because of a simple design of the plants, this technology is comparatively
19 Van Kuijk, Hans: Grate Furnace Combustion: A Model for the Solid Fuel Layer. Technical University Eindhoven, 2008
23
cheap. As a disadvantage a lower degree of efficiency because of an inhomogeneous
allocation on the grate could be mentioned here.20
4.2.2 Fluidized bed combustion
Fluidized bed combustion (FBC) is a combustion technology used in power plants.
Fluidized beds suspend solid fuels on upward-blowing jets of air during the combustion
process. The result is a turbulent mixing of gas and solids. The tumbling action, much
like a bubbling fluid, provides more effective chemical reactions and heat transfer.
Figure 11 shows the schematic view of a fluidized bed combustion plant.
Figure 11: Fluidized bed combustion (FBC).
Source: VTT
The 1st generation fluidized bed combustor uses a "bubbling-bed" technology. A relatively
stationary fluidized bed is established in the boiler using low air velocities to fluidize the
material, and a heat exchanger (boiler tube bundle) immersed in the bed to generate
steam. Cyclone separators are used to remove particulate matter from the flue gas prior
to entering a gas turbine, which is designed to accept a moderate amount of particulate
matter. Stationary FBC could be used with a nominal thermal capacity of roughly 3 – 20
MWth.
A 2nd generation fluidized bed combustor uses "circulating fluidized-bed" technology and
a number of efficiency enhancement measures. Circulating fluidized-bed technology has
the potential to improve operational characteristics by using higher air flows to entrain
and move the bed material, and re-circulating nearly all the bed material with adjacent
high-volume, hot cyclone separators. The relatively clean flue gas goes on to the heat
exchanger. This approach theoretically simplifies feed design, extends the contact
between sorbent and flue gas, reduces likelihood of heat exchanger tube erosion, and
improves SO2 capture and combustion efficiency. The circulating fluidized-bed is often
used in plants with high nominal thermal capacity of more than 30 MWth.21 But this
technology is also be used in plants with an nominal thermal capacity of about 5 MW, for
example in Finland.
20 Obernberger, Ingwald: Thermische Nutzung fester biogener Brennstoffe, TU Graz BIOS 2000 21 http://fluidizedbedcombustion.com/
24
The difference between the bubbling fluidised bed combustor (BFB) and the circulating
fluidised bed combustor (CFB) turns on the velocity at which gas is blown at the bed. In a
BFB combustor air velocity is lower and the particles behave like a boiling fluid but stay
in the bed. In a CFB combustor air velocity is higher and a large proportion of the bed
material leaves the bed and is collected by cyclone separators before recirculation to the
bed.
FBC plants are more flexible than conventional plants. They can be fired on coal and
biomass, among other fuels. This technology is characterized by very low NOx- emissions
and a high degree of efficiency. Disadvantages are the high sensitivity on ash melting
and slagging, as well as high investment and operating costs. Although this technology
has very low NOx- emissions, compared to others the dust concentration in fuel gas is
very high. To operate a FBC plant in partial load, a specific technology or a second fluid
bed is needed.
4.2.3 Pulverized fuel firing
Pulverized fuel firing is a solid fuel burning technique in which the fuel is pulverized
before being ignited. It is the most common method of burning coal and oil shale for
power generation. The basic idea of a firing system using pulverized fuel is to use the
whole volume of the furnace for the combustion of solid fuels. Coal is ground to the size
of a fine grain, mixed with air and burned in the flue gas flow. Biomass and other
materials can also be added to the mixture. Coal contains mineral matter which is
converted to ash during combustion. The ash is removed as bottom ash and fly ash. The
bottom ash is removed at the furnace bottom.22
There are three different types of pulverized fuel firing systems:
injection of the fuel through jets on a grate
injection of the fuel into a cyclone furnace
pulverized fuels system in combination with a grate furnace or a underfeed stokers to cover a range of different fuels
22 Obernberger, Ingwald: Thermische Nutzung fester biogener Brennstoffe, TU Graz BIOS 2000
25
Figure 12: Pulverized fuel firing system.23
Source: Marutzky 1999
Due to the small fuel particles and the excellent mixture with the air supply, this
technology is characterized by a low percentage of burnable materials in residues, low
NOx-emissions and a high efficiency. Compared to the fluidized bed combustion the
pulverized fuel firing technology has a very good output adjustability and could be
operated with 25% of nominal load without any changes in combustion characteristics. A
disadvantage of this technology is the high erosion and thermal strain of the combustion
chamber. Further the fuels have to be grinded and are limited to a particle size of < 10-
20 mm.
4.2.4 Future developments
The most common and convenient forms of woody biomass for domestic heating are split
logs, wood chips, wood pellets and briquettes. The grate furnace combustion technology
is used for domestic appliances adapted for different fuels and capacity.
The current biomass furnace technology in Europe has already achieved a very high
state-of-technology. Depending on the political framework requirements of the respective
country, there are differences in technology and quality of the biomass boilers, especially
concerning emissions and safety.
General development efforts are aimed to ensure a trouble-free operation and a high
operational comfort for the consumer. In this context, an automatic operation and
appropriate and resistant materials for the combustion chamber are of great importance.
Materials with resistance regarding corrosion to enlarge the service life of the furnace will
play a major role. Further control sensors, like the proven lambda control sensors, for
measuring the oxygen concentration in the flue gas, will be used more in future for
combustion control. In modern boiler systems, the whole process control is
microprocessor based. Automatic boiler cleaning systems are still developed, which
increase the efficiency and reduce dust emissions.
23 Marutzky, Seeger: Energie aus Holz und anderer Biomasse. DRW-Verlag Weinbrenner (Ed.) 1999
26
Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)-aided furnace development and optimization is a
promising future application in the small and medium-scale sector.
More developments in the combination of small scale biomass boilers and solar systems
could be expected the next years.
Further objectives cover research and development projects to reduce emissions. The
quality of boilers especially concerning emissions is different from country to country.
The reasons for this are different political frameworks requirements on emission limits
and testing procedures for boilers. The EN 303-5 “Heating boilers for solid fuels, hand
and automatically stoked, nominal heat output of up to 300 kW” is the first European
wide standard which regulates the test procedure for small scale boilers and includes also
limit values for emissions. Before that there were only a few countries like Austria,
Germany, Finland, Denmark and Sweden which have national requirements for testing
standards and emission limits for small wood-fired boilers. In addition Austria has very
strict regulations for emissions including limit values for dust, CO and NOx. International
political interests to limit emissions from small scale combustion sites are increasing. In
the future further research and development activities to reduce emissions from biomass
boilers are needed.
The development of small-scale commercialized gasification systems is in its early
stages. However, gasification technology has been around a long time but all-in-one
(gasifier, filter, generator, etc.) unit is difficult to find as in the past most are designed
and built from new. The wood, be it chips or pellets are fed into the gasifier unit where
the charred wood reacts with carbon dioxide and air/oxygen/steam to produce carbon
monoxide and methane. The so-called producer gas is then filtered through the cleaning
system and can be burned at higher efficiencies than it would have been possible by the
direct combustion of the wood chips.
Figure 13 below shows the schematic view of the current used gasification technologies.
Figure 13: Current available gasification technologies
Source: VTT
4.3 Current state of cooling with biomass
International studies forecast a strong rise in energy consumption for cooling. At present
cooling mainly work with air condition produced by electrically operated compressor
chillers. This technology intensifies the existing power supply problems such as high peak
27
loads in summer. New developments afford cooling systems running with thermal energy
from district heating networks.
The following chapter gives a short overview of the technical principle of current biomass
cooling systems. At present biomass cooling is only used in centralized systems, for
example in combination with a district heating plant. Decentralized cooling systems are
currently driven by electricity or solar power. There are research and development
activities in the area of residential biomass cooling. The technology is currently not ready
for the market. The efficiency and the costs of such systems make the competitiveness
to compression heat pumps difficult.
In general thermal driven cooling technologies are based either on the absorption or
adsorption principle. In contrast to conventional chillers, this systems use heat instead of
mechanical energy to provide cooing. The following thermal driven sorption chillers are
currently available:
Water/lithium-bromide: absorption chillers
Ammonia/water: absorption chillers
Water/silica-gel: adsorption chillers
Desiccant-Evaporative Cooling (DEC) chillers: open adsorption process
The distinctions of these technologies are the available cooling capacity, required heat
capacity and hot water inlet temperature as well as in the coefficient of performance
(COP) which means the ratio of cooling output to thermal input.
4.3.1 The absorption chillers
In the absorption chiller technology, the refrigerant is compressed in a thermal way,
while in the conventional chiller, mechanical compression is used. If the chiller makes use
of the heat input just once, it is called a single effect or one-stage process. At the single-
stage absorption cycle process the refrigerant liquid boils in a deep vacuum and removes
heat from the chilled water circuit when flowing over the surface of the evaporator coil.
Subsequently the refrigerant vapor gets absorbed by the concentrated absorbent solution
in the absorber.
Figure 14 shows the basic of the single-effect absorption chiller.
28
Figure 14: operation cycle of one-stage absorption chiller system.
Source: Energy Solutions Center
The resulting dilute solution is pumped into the generator onto a higher pressure, where
the refrigerant is boiled off using a heat source. In the next step the refrigerant vapor
and the absorbent get separated. The refrigerant vapor flows to the condenser, where it
is condensed on the surface of the cooling coil. Afterwards the refrigerant liquid passes
through an orifice into the evaporator while the reconcentrated solution returns to the
absorber to complete the cycle. Electric energy is only needed for pumping the dilute
solution and for control units. At this technology electric energy is only needed for
pumping and for control units.
Higher efficiency can be reached with a two-stage or double-effect absorption process
which needs higher medium inlet temperatures. For this reason they are either directly
fired with natural gas or fuel oil or using hot exhaust gas from combustion engines or
they are driven by steam or hot water over 130 °C. The double-effect absorption cycle
differs from the single cycle insofar as it captures some internal heat which is normally
rejected to the recooling circuit. This thermal energy of the absorption process in the
absorber is used to boil out refrigerant vapor in a second generator additionally. Thus the
efficiency is raised, less heat is needed and less heat must be rejected. 24
4.3.2 Supply concepts for chilled water
There are two main supply concepts for chilled water produced by thermal driven chillers
in combination with biomass combustion.
One possibility is the central generation system, which can be realized with a number of
technologies and is in general used for district cooling. The chilled water is produced in
district heating plants in absorption chillers. A separate network distributes the chilled
water to the consumer. At the costumers the chilled water takes up the heat from the air
using fan-coils and cooling surfaces, like existing radiators.
24 Krawinkler, R., Simader, G.: Meeting cooling demands in SUMMER by applying HEAT from cogeneration. AEA 2007
29
Figure 15: Central absorption cooling – district cooling network.
Source: Austria Energy Agency
A second possibility is the individual absorption cooling unit, where an individual
absorption cooling unit is installed in or close to every building. Thereby the chilled water
is produced by a thermal driven chiller where it is needed. In this case the absorption
chillers take the heat from a district heating network. The secondary network to
distribute the chilled water is only needed in the buildings.
Figure 16: Individual absorption cooling unit.
Source: Austria Energy Agency
These innovative concepts of district cooling networks mostly serve limited urban areas
or groups of office and administration buildings, public and private service buildings and
commercial companies. Besides this, also factors like the available space for the bigger
chillers and matters of recooling for example, also technical conditions must be
considered regarding this supply approach. In comparison with compressor systems,
thermal driven chillers are much bigger. On the one hand the existing district heat
connection must be able to match the required cooling capacity of the absorption chiller.
On the other hand the flow temperature of the district heating network during summer
operation and the relation between hot water inlet temperature and feasible cooling
capacity has to be taken into account. The combination of cooling technologies with
district heating systems requires careful analysis on the customer side as well as on the
heat generating side.25
There are several projects, which offer detailed information on the technological matters
of different cooling systems. There is the EU summerheat project, which published
technical reports with realized case studies and country market reports on the project
web page. (www.eu-summerheat.net)
The BioAWP project is another example of a research project, which had the goal to
develop a small scale high-efficient biomass-driven absorption heat pump for residential
heating and cooling.
25 Krawinkler, R., Simader, G.: Meeting cooling demands in SUMMER by applying HEAT from cogeneration. AEA 2007
30
A detailed description of a district cooling plant in Spain, powered with olive residues,
could be found in the annex of this report. The case study is part of Task 6.3 of this work
package and includes beside a technical description also a cost and emission calculation
and is compared to a conventional cooling plant powered by fossil fuels.
4.4 Biomass boiler producer catalogue
The following list shows the summary of the 59 company fact sheets. The list contains
the most important biomass boiler manufacturers from all participating countries. The
presented producers have been selected by the respective project partners. Detailed
information can be found in the long version of the company fact sheets in the annex.
31
Country Company
Name Website Address Contact Telephone Turnover Employees
Wood chips
Wood logs
Pellets
Other
Austria Anton Eder GmbH www.eder-heizung.at
Weyerstraße 350
A- 5733 Bramberg
gf@eder-
kesselbau.at
+43 (0) 6566 /
7366 - - X X X
Austria Hoval GmbH www.hoval.at Hovalstraße 11
A–4614 Marchtrenk
[email protected] +43 (0)50 365 –
0 ~ 41,5 Mio € 210 X X X X
Austria Ökofen GmbH www.pelletsheizung.at Gewerbepark 1
A-4133 Niederkappel
info@pelletsheizu
ng.at
+43 / 7286 /
7450 - ~ 300 X X
Austria Fröhling GmbH www.froeling.com Industriestraße 12
A-4710 Grieskirchen
m
+43 (0)7248 /
606 - 0 - ~ 600 X X X X
Austria Hargassner GmbH www.hargassner.at Anton Hargassnerstr. 1
A-4952 Weng i. Innkreis
office@hargassn
er.at
+43 / 7723 /
5274 - ~ 160 X X X X
Austria Herz Energie-
technik GmbH
www.herz-feuerung.com Herzstraße 1
7423 Pinkafeld
office-
+43 / 3357 /
42840-0 - > 150 X X X X
Austria Guntamatic
Heiztechnik GmbH
www.guntamatic. com Bruck 7
A-4722 Peuerbach
info@guntamatic
.com
+43 / 7276 /
2441-0 ~ 40,0 Mio € ~ 200 X X X X
Austria KWB GmbH www.kwb.at Industriestraße 235
A-8321 St.
Margarethen/Raab
[email protected] +43 / 3115 /
6116-0 ~ 50,0 Mio € ~ 205 X X X X
Austria SL-Technik GmbH www.lindner-sommerauer.at Trimmelkam 113
A-5120 St. Pantaleon
office@lindner-
sommerauer.at
+43 / 6277 /
7804-0 15-20 Mio € ~ 50 X X X
Austria SHT GmbH www.sht.at Rechtes Salzachufer 40
A-5101 Salzburg/Bergheim
[email protected] +43 / 662 / 450
444-0 - 41 X X X X
Austria Windhager GmbH www.windhager.com Anton-Windhager-Straße 20
A-5201 Seekirchen,
info@windhager.
com
+43 6212 2341-
0 ~ 80,0 Mio € ~ 470 X X X
Austria ETA GmbH www.eta.co.at Gewerbepark 1
A-4716 Hofkirchen
[email protected] +43 7734 / 2288
- 0 ~ 63,0 Mio € ~ 120 X X X X
Belgium BIOM www.biom.be Zoning Industriel des Hauts
Sarts
3ème avenue, 15
BE 4040 Herstal
[email protected] +32(0)4 256 90
08 - 5 X
Belgium BURNECO www.burneco.be Rue des vieux près, 103 BE
6860 Leglise
+32 63 43 39 61 ~ 1,0 Mio € 20 X X
Belgium VYNCKE N.V. www.vyncke.com Gentsesteenweg 224 BE
8530 Harelbeke
m
+ 32 56 730 630 30-40 Mio € 230
Belgium Saint-Roch www.saint-roch-couvin.com Rue de la gare, 36 BE 5660
Couvin
info@saintrochco
uvin.com
+32(0)60 34 56
51 25 Mio € 120 X X X X
Czech Republic
TTS Energo www.tts.cz Průmyslová 163
CZ 674 01 Třebíč
[email protected] +42 568 837
611 16.5 Mio € 75 X X X X
32
Country Company
Name Website Address Contact Telephone Turnover Employees
Wood chips
Wood logs
Pellets
Other
Czech
Republic
Step TRUTNOV www.steptrutnov.cz Horská 695 541 02 Trutnov
4
pavlicek@steptru
tnov.cz
+42 499 407
407 3.85 Mio € 50 X X X
Czech Republic
EVECO Brno www.evecobrno.cz Brezinova 42
Brno - Czech Republic
filip@evecobrno.
cz
+420 544 527
231 1.35 Mio € 20 X X
Denmark Passat energi A/S www.passat.dk Vestergade 36, Ørum
DK 8830 Tjele
k
+45 8665 2100 - - X X X X
Denmark BAXI www.baxi.dk Smedevej,
DK 6880 Tarm
[email protected] +45 9737 1511 - - X X X X
Denmark TwinHeat www.twinheat.dk Nørrevangen 7,
DK 9631 Gedsted
kontakt@twinhea
t.dk
+45 9864 5222 - 15 X X X X
Finland Veljekset Ala-
Talkkari Oy
www.ala-talkkari.fi Hellanmaantie 619,
DK 62130 Hellanmaa
antti.ala-
talkkari@ala-
talkkari.fi
+358 6 4336
333 15 Mio € 85 X X X X
Finland Ariterm Oy www.ariterm.fi PL 59, Uuraistentie 1
FI 43100 Saarijärvi
veijo.kilkkila@ari
term.fi
+358 14 426
300 12 Mio € 130 X X X X
Finland Laatukattila Oy www.laka.fi Vihiojantie 10,
FI 33800 Tampere
laatukattila@laka
.fi
+358 3 214
1411 6 Mio € 45 X X X X
France HS FRANCE www.hsfrance.com Rue Andersen
FR 67870 Bischoffsheim
m
+33 (0)3 88 49
27 57 15 Mio € 28 X X X X
France SELF CLIMAT –
MORVAN
www.chaudieres-
morvan.com
Rue des Epinettes - Z.I. Sud
FR 77200 Torcy
om
+33 (0)1 60 05
18 53 8 Mio € 32 X X X
France PERGE www.perge.fr CD7 BP7
FR 26800 Portes lès Valence
[email protected] +33 (0)4 75 57
81 63 - - X X
Germany Paul Künzel GmbH www.kuenzel.de Ohlrattweg 5
D-25497 Prisdorf
[email protected] +49 4101 / 7000
0 - ~ 50 X X X
Germany HDG Bavaria GmbH www.hdg-bavaria.com Siemensstraße 22
D-84323 Massing
info@hdg-
bavaria.com
+49 8724/8970 30 Mio € 200 X X X
Germany Nolting GmbH www.nolting-online.de Aquafinstr. 15
D-32760 Detmold
info@nolting-
online.de
+49 52 31 / 95
55 0 10 Mio € 55 X X X X
Germany Bosch
Thermotechnik,
Buderus
Deutschland
www.buderus.de Sophienstraße 30-32
D-35576 Wetzlar
[email protected] +49 6441 / 418
0 - - X X X X
Germany Biotherm
Pelletheizungen
www.pelletheizung. de Friedrich-Winter Str. 6
D- 35630 Ehringshausen
info@pelletheizu
ng.de
+49 6440 /
929714 - 4 X
Germany Hans-Jürgen Helbig
GmbH
www.helbig-gmbh.de Pappelbreite 3
D-37176 Nörten-Hardenberg
info@helbig-
gmbh.de
+49 55 03 / 99
74 - 21 4 Mio € 30 X X X
33
Country Company
Name Website Address Contact Telephone Turnover Employees
Wood chips
Wood logs
Pellets
Other
Greece Samaras Biomass
Heating
www.nsamaras.gr 32nd km Lavriou Av.
19003, Markopoulo, Attiki
r
+30 22990
63480 - - X X X X
Greece THERMODYNAMIKI
SA –
Heating products
industry
www.combi.gr 1st Km Ptolemaidas -
Ardassas P.C. 502 00,
Ptolemaida, P.O. BOX 1
[email protected] +30 24630
28013 - - X X X
Greece “Β.Ε.Η.-Μ.Ε.Π.” .
Helias K.
Voulgarakis
www.veimep.gr Chilia Dendra
43100, Karditsa
hnet.gr
+30 24410
25359 - 17 X X
Latvia GRANDEG www.grandeg.lv Brivibas alley 439, Riga LV-
1024, Latvia
v
+371 6407 1177 ~ 1,0 Mio € < 50 X X X X
Latvia JSC Komforts www.komforts.eu Liela street 59, Tukums,
Latvia, LV-3101
sergejs@komfort
s.eu
+ 371 63125057 ~ 4 Mio € 115 X X X X
Latvia “ORIONS” Jurmalas
Karla Zarina Ltd
www.orions.lv Antenas street 3, Riga LV-
1004, Latvia
[email protected] + 371 67892222
(67629139) - - X X X
Lithuania JSC "Atrama" www.atrama.lt Raudondvario pl. 162,
LT-47174 Kaunas, Lithuania
[email protected] ( 370 37) 36 18
01 3.93 Mio € 124 X
Lithuania UAB "Kalvis" www.kalvis.lt Pramonės g. 15,
LT-78135, Šiauliai,
[email protected] 370 41 540-564 6 Mio € 220 X X X X
Lithuania AB „Umega“ www.umega.lt Metalo str. 5,
LT-20115 Utena,
[email protected] 370 389 53542 11 Mio € 500 X X X X
Portugal Chama –
Equipamentos
Térmicos, S.A.
www.chama.com.pt Polo Industrial de Vale de
Borregão
Cortegaça
3450-032 Mortágua
martinsjuliao@ch
ama.com.pt
+351 231 922
574 1.35 Mio € 52 X
Portugal A.D.F. www.adf.pt Zona Industrial da Relvinha
– Sarzedo – Arganil-
Portugal
Ap. 55
[email protected] 00351-
235710710 - - X X
Slovakia ATTACK, s.r.o. www.attack.sk Dielenská Kružná 5 ,
038 61 VRUTKY
[email protected] +421 43 / 4003
115 18.6 Mio € 75-130 X X
Slovakia Ecoprotect CDK
s.r.o
www.ecoprotectcdk.eu Zvolenska cesta 61/B
974 05 Banská Bystrica,
SLOVAKIA
info@ecoprotectc
dk.eu
+421 / 48/416
18 26 150.000 € 5 X X
Slovakia MAGA s.r.o. www.magasro.sk Samuela Kollára 86, 9
79 01 Čerenčany, SLOVAKIA
magasro@magas
ro.sk
+421 47 563
4798 600.000 € 10 X X X
34
Country Company
Name Website Address Contact Telephone Turnover Employees
Wood chips
Wood logs
Pellets
Other
Slovenia KIV d.d. www.kiv.si Vransko 66
3305 – Vransko
Slovenia
[email protected] + 386 (0) 3 70
34 100 18 Mio € 70 X X X X
Slovenia ETIKS d.o.o. www.etiks.si Ob Dragi 3
3220 Štore, Slovenia
[email protected] +386 (0)3 780
22 80 3.1 Mio € 13 X X X X
Slovenia WVterm d.o.o. www.wvterm.si Valvasorjeva 73
2000 Maribor, Slovenia
wvterm@wvterm
.si
+ 386 2 42 96
941 - 80 X X X X
Spain BRONPI, S.L. www.bronpi.es Cordoba-Malaga Highway,
14900, Lucena, Cordoba,
España
gerencia@bronpi.
com
+0034-957 502
750 11 Mio € 70 X X
Spain Inmecal www.inmecal.com La Catalana” Industrial Area,
Irlanda St., 15.
18360 Huétor Tájar,
Granada, España
m
+0034-958 333
789 1.5 Mio € 14 X X X
Spain Vulcano-Sadeca www.vulcanosadeca.es De Rivas St, Nº 27, C.P.
28052, Madrid, España
sadeca@vulcano
sadeca.es
+0034-91-776-
05-00 12 Mio € 60 X X X X
Sweden Värmebaronen AB www.varmebaronen.se Värmebaronen AB
Arkelstorpsvägen 88
291 94 Kristianstad
Sweden
info@varmebaro
nen.se
+46 (0)44-22 62
20 13.7 Mio € 90 X X X
Sweden Enertech AB www.enertech.se Enertech AB
Box 309
S-341 26 Ljungby
Sweden
[email protected] +46 (0)372 880
00 188 Mio € 350 X X X X
Sweden Ariterm group AB www.ariterm.se Ariterm Sweden AB
Flottiljvägen 15
S-392 41 Kalmar
Sweden
[email protected] +46 (0)480 44
28 50 21 Mio € 147 X X
United
Kingdom
e
Broag Remeha www.uk.remeha.com Remeha House Molly Millars
Lane Wokingham Berkshire
RG41 2QP
daveh@broag-
remeha.com
07850 618658
~ 4.3 Mio € 17 X X X
United Kingdom
e
Bioenergy
Technology Limited
www.bioenergy.org Farley Farm
Chiddingly, Nr Lewes
East Sussex BN8 6HW
sales@bioenergy
.org
01825 890140
~ 900.000 € 15 X X X X
35
4.5 Conclusions
The thermal use of woody biomass is mature technology and a wide range of products
with different combustion technologies and capacities are available. The most common
fuels are split wood logs, wood chips, wood pellets and briquettes.
In the residential sector, especially for single-family houses, wood logs and wood pellets
are the common biomass form for heat production. These types of heating systems could
be easily installed in houses and dwellings and are often used for a heat demand of <
25kW. The demand for heat in houses will decrease in future because of low energy
standards in houses and good insulations. Therefore heating systems which could be
operated in a low capacity range are needed. Modern wood pellets boilers are
characterized through high controllability and efficiency. These boiler types offer the
consumer a high level of comfort because of automatic operation.
Wood chips technologies are often used for systems with capacities of >30 kW. For
farms, office and administration buildings, public and private service buildings and
commercial companies as well as apartment buildings with a higher heat demand. In
particular wood chip boilers are used for biomass fueled district heating plants. The
boilers are available only for high capacity (> 30 kW), offer also high level of comfort
because of automatic operation, but regard a large storage for fuels.
In general the technology and quality varies from country to country. Reasons therefore
are different political framework requirements on emissions and safety. In some
European countries emissions limits have to be met to launch a boiler on the market,
while others don‟t have any requirements and limitations.
Future developments for biomass boilers will concentrate on operation comfort and
emission reduction, in particular to use also non woody biomass. Large scale plants are
equipped with secondary measures to reduce emissions. In small-scale plants,
developments to reduce emissions are often limited on primary measures, like
modification of the combustion chamber. There is still a potential to reduce emissions in
small-scale plants and further research and development activities are needed.
At present, cooling with biomass is limited to centralized systems often in combination
with a district plant. Heat is used as energy for a thermal driven chiller. The combination
of cooling technologies with district heating systems requires careful analysis on the
customer side as well as on the heat generating side. Small-scale biomass cooling
systems are currently not available on the market. There are some projects on this topic,
but currently decentralized cooling systems are based on air condition produced by
electrically operated compressor chillers.
In the line of EUBIONET III WP6 a catalogue of biomass boiler producer is published.
Company fact sheets of 59 European boiler manufacturers of the participating countries
are provided. Countries like Austria, Germany, Finland and Sweden do have a very broad
range of different producers for small-scale boilers. Boilers are traded within whole
Europe. Especially East-European countries are concentrated on home markets and
export their product limited to Europe and Russia. Producers in Austria, Germany, Finland
and Sweden export their boiler within Europe, Russia, but also to North and South
American Countries and also to Asian markets. The analysis of the company fact sheets
shows that Austrian producers have the biggest export quota from 60 % to 85 %.
The distribution of boilers is mainly organized via installers and distributions companies.
In rare cases boiler producers have their own sales department and products could be
ordered directly from the manufacturer. Only a few companies do have own branch
offices abroad, most of the companies process their exports via distribution organizations
in the respective countries.
36
5 Investigation of costs – Task 6.3
The major advantages of using biomass, along with being a carbon neutral fuel is the
potential of cost savings based on present-day prices. The use of biomass fuels provides
an incentive for the sustainable management of local woodland, it adds to the local
economy and the establishment of a reliable supply chain.
5.1 Aim and Methodology
A major aim of EUBIONET III work package 6 - Task 6.3 “Investigations of costs” was to
describe the different heating situations in the participating countries. Based on actual
market prices for boilers and fuels a comparison between the use of fossil and biomass
fuels were carried out in form of case studies. The main focus of the case studies was the
cost comparison of fossil and biomass fuels including investments for a new heating
system as well as costs for an existing heating system in different applications. Beside
the economical aspects, a further aim was to analyze the ecological effects of different
heating systems. Therefore the CO2 equivalent emissions were calculated and the savings
were pointed out in case when a fossil fuel based heating system is changed by a
biomass heating system.
Beside the collection of market prices for boilers, fuels and heating/cooling technology,
within the case studies a description of the heating practice and financial support
schemes of the respective countries was carried out. Further the case studies should
serve as best-practice-examples for interested people and should support the decision-
making procedure for people, who are interested in changing their heating system.
The case studies describe implemented examples or are based on model calculations with
realistic market prices. Each case description includes the calculation of costs and
emissions for a fossil fuel based heating system and at least one biomass based heating
system with similar capacity. The data for the case studies are collected by interviews
and contacts with building owners, plant operators or installers.
The first part of each case study is a description of the actual situation. It contains a
specification of the current heating system and facility, as well as the fuel types, the
amount of fuels and the prices. Beside the definition of the size of heating the heating
space, every case study also includes a new calculation of the heat demand and the
capacity of the boiler. There are two different ways to calculate the heating load. The first
one is via room heating load and the second one is due to the fuel demand. The room
heating load consists of the transmission heat loss (wall area, insulation, temperature
difference of indoor and outdoor) and heat loss through aeration. Because of no
structural alterations or insulation of the building envelope and in further consequence no
changes in the heat demand, the heating load is calculated due to the fuel demand in
most case studies. The dimension of the actual heating system is calculated due to the
annual use efficiency, an estimation of the full load hours and the heat demand. Some
data are estimated and especially the annual use efficiency could include an uncertainty
of 10 to 20%, depending on climate conditions.
The explanation of the actual situation is followed by a technical description of the
alternative heating system and the requirements of logistics and storage. Further the
investment costs and the annual fuel costs were listed for each new and existing heating
variant.
In the next step the costs of each heating system of the case study were compared in
the form of a table, calculated absolute and in €/MWh. The fixed costs consist of the
investment costs, which are calculated by a simplified annuity method with an actual rate
37
of interest for each respective country and a specific service life. The variable costs are
the annual fuel costs.
A major topic of the case studies was the calculation of the emission in CO2 equivalent.
The data for this calculation were taken from GEMIS 4.6. GEMIS is a life-cycle analysis
program and database for energy, material and transport systems. It includes the total
life-cycle in its calculation of impacts for example fuel delivery, materials used for
construction, waste treatment and transports/auxiliaries. The greenhouse gas emissions
of all heating alternatives include the whole upstream chain as well as the emissions at
the combustion site. The main CO2 emissions for fossil fuel powered heating systems are
caused by burning the fuels in the heating system. The emissions from the upstream
chain have relatively low proportion. While the green house gas emissions of the biogenic
heating systems like wood log and wood chips mostly consists of the emissions for the
processing and supplying of the combustibles, for example the fuel for forwarders,
processors, trucks, chips and so on. The figures for the CO2-equivalent emissions should
be seen as bench mark, there may be some deviations to measured values. The data for
the calculations are taken from GEMIS and refers to estimations and average values from
measurements of similar boilers with similar capacity.
To compare the ecological affects of each heating system, the emissions were calculated
in kg/MWh. Additionally the annual total emissions are analyzed to get the emission
reduction, when a fossil based system is replaced by a biomass heating system.
5.2 List of Case studies
In total 32 case studies with 59 different heating systems were carried out. These
heating systems are fired with 18 different fuel types, 9 biomass fuels like wood chips,
wood pellets, wood logs, olive residues, straw. Also 6 different fossil fuels, like heating
oil, natural gas, LPG, propane gas, electricity and 3 biomass fossil fuel combinations, for
example wood chips with heating oil and wood pellets with natural gas in different
proportions are covered.
Subject of the case studies are different objects with a wide range of capacity. The WP
includes case studies about single family houses with a boiler capacity of 8 kW up to 46
kW as well as a plants with about 1 MW for the Royal Palace in Sweden, or a 3.2 MW
plant in a district heating and cooling system in Spain.
The following list shows a summary of all WP6 Case Studies. The list includes information
on type of building, the heat demand, the respective fuels and the reduction of the total
yearly CO2-equivalent emissions of each case study. Detailed descriptions and
information are available in the long version of the case studies in the annex.
38
Country Object Yearly Heat
demand Capacity Biomass fuels Fossil fuels
Total Yearly
Emission reduction
in CO2-equivalents
Austria 1 cloister 482.58 MW 225 kW Log wood, wood chips
Heating oil 12 t
Austria 2 Single-family
house 21.5 MW 10 kW
Wood pellets District heating-
biomass
Heating oil 7.7 t
Bulgaria 1 Single-family
house 46.2 MW 25 kW
Log wood,
wood pellets Heating oil 11 t
Czech Republic
1
mechanical
industry factory 850 MW 1 MW
Wood chips,
wood chips/straw Propane gas 239.3 t
Czech Republic 2
rape oil
treatment factory
15,295 MW 2.7 MW Rape-cake, Wood chips
Natural gas 4,500 t
Denmark 1 midsize Danish
Pig Farm 474.4 MW 165 kW
Wood chips, straw
Heating oil 138 t
Denmark 2 Single-family
house 33.2 MW 23 kW Wood pellets Heating oil 9.4 t
Finland 1 School building 285.8 MW 200 kW Wood pellets Heating oil 94.2 t
Finland 2 Finnish Manor 390 MW 250 kW Wood briquettes Heating oil 128.3 t
Germany 1 Factory building 3,400/2,380
MW 2.3 MW/900 kW Wood pellets
Heating oil, Natural gas
1,160 t
Germany 2 Single-family
house 30 MW 8 kW Wood pellets
Heating oil, Natural gas
4.2 t
Greece 1 Greenhouse unit 1,150 MW 1.2 MW Exhausted olive
cake Crude oil 380 t
Hungary 1 Club house 47.48 50 kW Wood logs,
Wood pellets Natural gas 13 t
Ireland 1 Single-family
house 18.5 MW 25 kW Wood pellets
Heating Oil, LPG
6 t
Ireland 2 Single-family
house 22.3 MW 25 kW Wood pellets
Heating Oil, LPG
7.3 t
39
Country Object Yearly Heat
demand Capacity Biomass fuels Fossil fuels
Total Yearly
Emission reduction
in CO2-equivalents
Ireland 3 Single-family
house 27.2 MW 35 kW
Wood logs, Wood pellets
Heating oil 9 t
Latvia 1 Paper-mill 32,725 MW 3.1 MW Wood logs, Wood chips
Heating oil 6,470 t
Latvia 2 District heating
system 4,524 MW 1 MW
Wood chips, Wood pellets
Natural gas 1,320 t
Lithuania 1 Hospital building 1,186 MW 395 kW Wood chips,
straw Heating oil 385.2 t
Lithuania 2 Single-family
house 41.6 MW 16 kW
Wood chips, wood pellets,
wood briquettes
Natural gas 10.1 t
Portugal 1 School building 48 MW 68-76 kW Wood pellets Natural Gas,
LPG 14.5 t
Portugal 2 School building 46.7 MW 75 kW Wood pellets +
solar LPG + solar 14 t
Slovakia 1 Single-family
house 33.35 20 kW
Log wood,
wood pellets Natural gas 9.6 t
Slovakia 2 School building 119 MW 60-75 kW Log wood,
Wood pellets Electricity 122 t
Slovenia 1 School building 1.420 MW 320 kW Wood chips Heating oil 540 t
Slovenia 2 School building 211 MW 120 kW Wood chips Heating oil 81 t
Spain 1 District heating
and cooling plant 7,674 MW 3.26 MW
olive trimmings
and kernels Heating oil 1,653 t
Spain 2 Hotel building 1,400 MW 700 kW Olive kernels Propane
boiler 483 t
Sweden 1 Palace building 6,600 MW 900 kW Wood chips,
Wood pellets Heating oil 940 t
Sweden 2 Single-family
house 30 MW 15 kW
Wood pellets,
Log wood Heating oil 10 t
40
Country Object Yearly Heat
demand Capacity Biomass fuels Fossil fuels
Total Yearly
Emission reduction
in CO2-equivalents
United
Kingdom 1 School building 144.7 MW 106 kW Wood pellets
Heating oil,
Natural gas 41 t
United
Kingdom 2 Rainforest centre 766 MW 255 kW Wood chips Heating oil 203 t
41
5.3 Results of the case studies
The following part shows the summarized results and interpretations of the WP 6 case
studies.
The cost reduction is still the most relevant factor, by which consumer come to a decision
for a heating system. The costs of heat production are composed of the investment costs
and the variable costs in form of fuel costs and operative costs. To simplify, operative
costs are not included in most of the case studies and therefore they are not considered
in the analyses of the results. As mentioned before the case studies contents a wide
range of different fuel types and boiler capacities. Wood pellets boiler are the most
frequent calculated biomass fuel systems in the case studies. 18 case studies deal with
wood pellets and the boiler capacity range from 8 kW up to 1 MW, but mostly used in
residential buildings with a capacity from 8 kW to 75 kW.
The second most commonly biomass fuel in the case studies was wood chips with 12
different heating system examples. The capacities of the boiler range from 120 kW up to
3.3 MW and was typically calculated in case studies of large buildings with a high heat
demand like school buildings, the cloister and the palace as well as district heating
systems and factories. Log wood heating systems were topic of 8 case studies and the
capacities range from 15 kW up to 225 kW. One case study includes a log wood boiler
system with a capacity of 3.1 MW, but because of enormous fuel demand and
expenditure of time for plant operation, this system could not be realized in practice.
The Figure 17 shows the correlation of the investment costs and boiler capacity in kW. It
shows that the investments cost increase with a higher boiler capacity for biomass as
well as for fossil fuel based heating systems. Investment costs are also depending on the
used technology and the fuels. The cheapest systems are log wood boiler. These boilers
do not have any facilities for automatic charging and expensive storage technologies.
Figure 17: Correlation of investment costs and boiler capacity.
Source: FJ BLT
42
The investment costs for biomass boilers are higher than for fossil fueled boilers by
trend. The lowest investment costs for fossil fueled heating systems are reported for gas
boilers, connected to the gas grid and electric heaters. These systems have no technical
equipment for storage or feeding. Also heating oil boiler systems have lower acquisition
costs compared to all reported biomass boilers.
The substantially factor regarding cost expenditure for heat production beside investment
costs are the current costs. The calculation of the total costs in the case studies includes
the fixed costs and the variable costs. The fixed costs consist of the investment costs,
which are calculated by a simplified annuity method with an actual rate of interest for
each respective country and a specific service life. The variable costs are (mainly) the
annual fuel costs.
The average total costs and the allocation of the fixed and the variable costs for the most
common fuels in the case studies are shown in the Figure 18. Because of high prices for
fossil fuels, the investment costs play a less significant role regarding the total costs for
the yearly heat production. Although low investment costs, the total costs for fossil fuel
based heating systems, except from natural gas, are more expensive than biomass
based fuels.
Figure 18: Allocation of fixed and variable costs.
Source: FJ BLT
The Figure 19 shows the correlation of the total cost in €/MWh and the boiler capacity. In
contrast to the investment costs, the total costs of biomass boiler systems are mostly
lower due to lower fuel prices than fossil based systems. The ratio of fixed and variable
fuels is strongly depending on the current fuel prizes. As the German case study 2 shows,
with high wood pellets prices of more than 220 €/t in the year 2009, it could be cheaper
to use heating oil or natural gas. But in more than 95% of the case studies, the fossil
fuelled boiler system has higher specific total costs as the biomass alternative.
The most expensive biomass heating systems are wood pellets by trend. Reasons
therefore are relatively high fuel prices and high investment costs because of high level
technology. On the other hand this technology secures a very reliable heating system,
43
which can also be operated on a low capacity level and offers comfort because of a high
degree of automation.
Figure 19: Correlation of total cost in €/MWh and the boiler capacity.
Source: FJ BLT
There are partly strong variations of total costs within one fuel category. The variations
are caused by different boiler capacities and different prices for boilers and fuels within
the participating countries. The following graph gives on overview of the ranges of total
costs in €/MWh for the most common fuels in the case studies. The colored bars show
the average value and the error bars show the variability in results from maximum to
minimum.
The largest variation could be found for wood pellets heating systems. This fuel type is
used in boilers with a capacity from 8 kW to 1 MW, from a standalone boiler for room
heating as well as for a district heating plant. These systems include different levels of
technology and causes variations in investment costs. The annual fixed costs range from
2.6 €/MWh in the Latvian case study up to nearly 110 €/MWh for a wood pellets heating
system in Ireland.
The fuel prices for wood pellets range from 120 €/t in the Latvian case study up to more
than 200 €/ton in the German and Austrian example. Further there are strong variations
in fuel prices for natural gas and heating oil for within the case studies.
44
Figure 20: Dispersion of the total costs in €/MWh within the fuels categories.
Source: FJ BLT
The calculation of the emission and the comparison of different heating systems was a
central aim of the case studies. The emissions of the respective heating systems are
calculated with the life-cycle-analyzing software GEMIS. The figures for CO2-equivalent
emissions should be seen as bench mark, there may be some deviations to actual
measured values at the respective boiler.
The Figure 21 shows the specific reduction of CO2-equivalent emissions in kilogram per
MWh heat output. The partly large variations are due to different boiler capacities,
technologies and heat demands.
Figure 21: Specific reduction of CO2-equivalent emissions in kg per MWh heat output.
Source: FJ BLT
45
The numbers beside the fuels types in the graph shows how many data are comprised in
the analysis.
The case studies include boilers with a wide range of capacity and therefore different
technology is used to produce heat with the same fuel. Big plants have specific
equipment, so called secondary measures like separator and filters, while many small-
scale boilers do not have precaution for emission reduction.
The GEMIS database considers also the energy used for production of technology and
fuels for respective countries. Therefore there are differences from the whole upstream
process until the final consumption within one fuel type.
The reduction potential of a biomass heating system depends on the type of fossil fueled
heating system which it is compared to. The highest reduction was calculated in the
Slovakian case study 2. Replacing the electric heater by a log wood boiler, emissions of
more than 1020 kg per MWh are reduced. The large portion of fossil based plants for
electricity production leads to very high emissions. The average reduction for all
described biomass fuels range from 330 kg/MWh to 410 kg/MWh.
The total emission depends on the required heat demand. If all case studies are realized
and the fossil based heating systems are replaced by the described biomass systems,
total emissions of 19,016 tones CO2- equivalent emissions can be yearly reduced.
Regarding emissions, it is always worth to replace a fossil based heating system by
biomass. Even with a mixture of fossil and biomass fueled heating systems, all case
studies reached a reduction potential of more than 90%.
The use of biomass for heat production has a huge potential to reduce emissions
especially in the non ETS (EU Emissions Trading System) sectors, such as agriculture,
transport, residential and some industry. As the case studies have shown the economic
aspects are depending on the development of fuel prices. With an increasing price for
fossil fuels in the future, biomass based heating and even cooling systems will become
more competitive.
Currently government support schemes play a decisive role in some European Countries.
Some countries offer grants for activities to improve the energy efficiency of buildings
and for investments on biomass based heating systems. These financial support schemes
help to close the gap of investment costs between fossil and biomass based heating
systems, so that an economic benefit arise beside the ecological advantage of biomass
heating.
The increasing use of biomass will also raise the problem of scarcity of raw materials.
Especially woody biomass is also in great demand for a number of material utilizations
such as the wood particle board and paper industry. A future challenge would be to
acquire unused woody biomass resources and agricultural residues for energy production
as well as for material utilization.
46
6 List of references
Energy Consumption in Households – Progress Report WG 2009.
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=de
tailed&sb=Title
Froning et al.: District heating and cooling – Country By Country Survey 2009.
Euroheat&Power
IEA – Renewables for heating and Cooling. Untapped Potential. Paris 2007
Krawinkler, R., Simader, G.: Meeting cooling demands in SUMMER by applying HEAT
from cogeneration. AEA 2007
Marutzky, Seeger: Energie aus Holz und anderer Biomasse. DRW-Verlag Weinbrenner
(Ed.) 1999
Obernberger, Ingwald: Thermische Nutzung fester biogener Brennstoffe, TU Graz BIOS
2000
Renewables in global energy supply. An IEA fact sheet. International Energy Agency
2007
Review of past work on Energy consumption in households,
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/consumption_households&vm=de
tailed&sb=Title
Roubanis, Nikolaos: Overview of the work of the Renewable Energy Statistics Working
Party.http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/statistics_30112007&vm=d
etailed&sb=Title
Roubanis et al.: Renewable energy statics. Eurostat statistics in focus 56/2010
Roubanis, Nikolaos: The current statistical system for Renewable Energy.
http://circa.europa.eu/Public/irc/dsis/chpwg/library?l=/statistics_30112007&vm=detailed
&sb=Title
Van Kuijk, Hans: Grate Furnace Combustion: A Model for the Solid Fuel Layer. Technical
University Eindhoven, 2008
47
7 Appendix 1 – List of Case Studies
D6.1.1 Martikainen, A. Pellet boiler of the Montana Gmbh & Co.KG, Germany 1, 7 p.
D6.1.2 Martikainen, A. Single-family house, Germany 2. 8 p.
D6.1.3 Kropác, J. Change of the heating system in Promet factory, Czech Republic 1, 7 p.
D6.1.4 Kropác, J. Change of heating system in rape oil treatment factory, Czech Republic
2, 7 p.
D6.1.5 Sulzbacher, L. Change of the heating system in the cloister Maria Langegg,
Austria 1, 9 p.
D6.1.6 Sulzbacher, L. Change of the heating system in a detached house in Lower
Austria, Austria 2, 7 p.
D6.1.7 Faber, A. Change of the heating system in a single-family house, Slovakia 1, 8 p.
D6.1.8 Faber, A. Change of the heating system in a school building, Evangelic boarding
school for handicapped children, Slovakia 2, 9 p.
D6.1.9 Almeida, T. Changing the heating system in a schools in the Portuguese Region of
“Vale Douro Norte”, Portugal 1. 9 p.
D6.1.10 Perednis, E. Change of the heating system on a Kacergine Rehabilitation
Hospital, Lithuania 1, 7 p.
D6.1.11 Perednis, E. Selection of the heating system on a new building private house,
Lithuania 2, 8 p.
D6.1.12 Porsö, C. & Vinterbäck, J. Change of the heating system in the Drottningholm
Palace, Sweden 1, 10 p.
D6.1.13 Porsö, C. & Vinterbäck, J. Change of heating system in a detached house in
western Sweden, Sweden 2, 8 p.
D6.1.14 Vertin, K. Change of the heating system in Forest and timber high school
Postojna, Slovenia 1, 8 p.
D6.1.15 Vertin, K. Energy audit and change of the heating system in the high school for
timber Skofja Loka, Slovenia 2, 7 p.
D6.1.16 Ujhelyi, P. Village club house for elderly people, Hungary, 8 p.
D6.1.17 Stankov P. & Markov, D. Change of heating system in a single family house in
Sofia, Bulgaria, 10 p.
D6.1.18 Hinge, J. Change of the heating system on a Danish pig farm, Denmark, 7 p.
D6.1.19 Hinge, J. Change of the heating system in a Danish private dwelling, Denmark, 6
p.
48
D6.1.20 Hillebrand, K. & Alakangas, E. Vehniä School – new heating system, Finland, 8
p.
D6.1.21 Hillebrand, K. & Alakangas, E. Muikunlahti Manor – new biomass heating
container, Finland, 8 p.
D6.1.22 Eleftheriadis, I. Exhausted olive cake to replace crude oil for greenhouse
heating, Greece, 8 p.
D6.1.23 Wickham, J. Installation of wood pellet boiler in new build in Ireland –
Threecastles, Ireland, 8 p.
D6.1.24 Wickham, J. Installation of wood pellet boiler in new build in Ireland –
Mullinahone, Ireland, 8 p.
D6.1.25 Wickham, J. Retrofit: Wood log boiler in new build in Ireland – Killkenny,
Ireland, 8 p.
D6.1.26 Ozolina, L. Change of the paper mill “Ligatne” heating system, Latvia, 7 p.
D6.1.27 Ozolina, L. Installation of a new heating system in “Silava” village, Latvia, 9 p.
D6.1.28 Almeida, T. Changing the heating system in the Escola Tecnológica e Profissional
de Sicó (Hybrid system biomass and solar), Portugal, 7 p.
D6.1.29 Macías Benigno, F., Robles Fernández, S. & Bueno Márquez, P. Geolit - District
heating and cooling central system with biomass, Spain, 10 p.
D6.1.30 Robles Fernández, S. & Bueno Márquez, P. Change of the heating system in the
Hotel La Bobadilla, Granada, Spain, 9 p.
D6.1.31 Diaz Chavez, R. RJ Mitchell School, primary school, Havering, London, UK, 9 p.
D6.1.32 Diaz Chavez, R. Living Rainforest, Berkshire, UK, 9 p.
49
8 Appendix 2 – List of Company fact sheets
D6.2.1 Austria: Anton Eder GmbH
D6.2.2 Austria: Hoval Ges.m.b.H
D6.2.3 Austria: ÖkoFen - Forschungs- und Entwicklungs Ges.m.b.H
D6.2.4 Austria: Fröling Ges.m.b.H
D6.2.5 Austria: Hargassner GmbH
D6.2.6 Austria: Herz Energietechnik GmbH
D6.2.7 Austria: GUNTAMATIK Heiztechnik GmbH
D6.2.8 Austria: KWB - Kraft und Wärme aus Biomasse GmbH
D6.2.9 Austria: Lindner & Sommerauer-Biomasse-Heizanlagen SL-Technik GmbH
D6.2.10 Austria: SHT Heiztechnik aus Salzburg GmbH
D6.2.11 Austria: Windhager Zentralheizung
D6.2.12 Austria: ETA - Heiztechnik GmbH
D6.2.13 Belgium: BIOM
D6.2.14 Belgium: BURNECO
D6.2.15 Belgium: VYNCKE N.V.
D6.2.16 Belgium: Saint-Roch
D6.2.17 Czech Republic: TTS Energo
D6.2.18 Czech Republic: Step TRUTNOV
D6.2.19 Czech Republic: EVECO Brno
D6.2.20 Denmark: Passat energi A/S
D6.2.21 Denmark: BAXI
D6.2.22 Denmark: TwinHeat
D6.2.23 Finland: Veljekset Ala-Talkkari Oy
D6.2.24 Finland: Ariterm Oy
D6.2.25 Finland: Laatukattila Oy
D6.2.26 France: HS FRANCE
D6.2.27 France: SELF CLIMAT - MORVAN
D6.2.28 France: PERGE
D6.2.29 Germany: Paul Künzel GmbH & Co
D6.2.30 Germany: HDG Bavaria GmbH Heizsysteme für Holz
D6.2.31 Germany: Nolting Holzfeuerungstechnik GmbH
D6.2.32 Germany: Bosch Thermotechnik, Buderus Deutschland
D6.2.33 Germany: Biotherm Pelletheizungen
D6.2.34 Germany: Hans-Jürgen Helbig GmbH
D6.2.35 Greece: Samaras Biomass Heating
D6.2.36 Greece: THERMODYNAMIKI SA - Heating products industry
D6.2.37 Greece: Helias K. Voulgarakis
D6.2.38 Latvia: GRANDEG
D6.2.39 Latvia: JSC Komforts
D6.2.40 Latvia: "ORIONS" Jurmalas Karla Zarina Ltd
D6.2.41 Lithuania: JSC "Atrama"
D6.2.42 Lithuania: UAB "Kalvis"
D6.2.43 Lithuania: AB "Umega"
D6.2.44 Portugal: Chama - Equipamentos Térmicos, S.A.
D6.2.45 Portugal: A.D.F.
D6.2.46 Slovakia: ATTACK, s.r.o.
D6.2.47 Slovakia: Ecoprotect CDK s.r.o.
D6.2.48 Slovakia: MAGA s.r.o.
D6.2.49 Slovenia: KIV d.d.
D6.2.50 Slovenia: ETIKS d.o.o.
D6.2.51 Slovenia: WVterm d.o.o.
D6.2.52 Spain: BRONPI, S.L.
50
D6.2.53 Spain: Inmecal
D6.2.54 Spain: Vulcano-Sadeca
D6.2.55 Sweden: Värmebaronen AB
D6.2.56 Sweden: Enertech AB
D6.2.57 Sweden: Ariterm group AB
D6.2.58 United Kingdom: Broag Remeha
D6.2.59 United Kingdom: Bioenergy Technology Limited