Corporate

THE VIENNA MODEL – DISTRICT HEATING AND CO-GENERATION

Over 280,000 households are supplied with district heating

40 years ago, Wien Energie Fernwärme recognised the hidden value of the municipal rubbish accumulating every day – namely that it is a valuable fuel that can be used to produce energy. The heat produced from burning 900,000 tonnes of rubbish every year can be taken and used to produce heating and hot water for households and businesses.

In Vienna, around 26% of daily heating requirements are met by incinerating household, industrial and hazardous waste. In short, Wien Energie currently supplies around 280,000 households and more than 5,500 large customers with environmentally friendly and cost-effective district heating by means of a roughly 1,100-km long network of pipes – and all the signs point to a further increase in demand.

Wien Energie constructs high efficiency power station

Wien Energie is investing around EUR 300m in the Simmering 1/2 power station repowering project, which will make it one of the most modern, efficient and environmentally friendly power stations in Europe. After coming online in the winter of 2008/2009, the new power station will supply around 800,000 households and more than 7,000 business customers with electricity, and almost 200,000 households with heating. What’s more, if you take into consideration the fact that oil-burning boilers are being replaced by district heating, then the new combined gas and steam turbine generating plant will save more than a million tonnes of CO₂ in emissions compared to a conventional coal-fired power plant.

Combined heat and power – creating heat from waste heat

The use of combined heat and power (CHP or co-generation) technology enables the waste heat from electricity produced in gas-fired power stations to be used effectively in supplying households and business customers with heating, making oil or coal burners (typical sources of CO₂) unnecessary for the end user. The Simmering power station in Vienna offers a clear example of the benefits of co-generation, reaching efficiency levels of over 81%.

Over the past 25 years, every calorific power station in Vienna has progressively been fitted with combined heat and power technology. The result has been that sulphur dioxide emissions have been cut by 99% and nitrogen emissions by 87%. In total, Wien Energie’s future contributions to reducing CO₂ emissions will tally 3.7 million tonnes annually thanks to its efforts to produce electricity and district heating in co-generation power stations and waste incineration plants.