Circular energy flows in cities – booster heat pumps

Waste heat can be recovered from many sources other than data centres, including sewage water, solar panels, supermarkets, paper mills, industry, hospital chillers, mink coat storage and crematories. Heat can be recovered using thermal exchangers to be transferred to where it is needed, and booster heat pumps can be added to supply the specific temperatures required for each application, such as space heating or hot water in buildings.

Waste heat can supply a significant share of cities’ heating and cooling requirements. Utilisation of waste heat has many advantages, including reduction of waste energy and costs, revenue generation and increase of electrification through replacement of fossil fuel use with heat pumps in district heating networks. Cities that now recover heat from sewage water include Vancouver in Canada (SHARC Energy, 2020) and Cologne in Germany (Celsius, 2020).