[Thermal atlas] Major enhancements made to the Heat Roadmap Europe energy planning tool

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Roberta D'Angiolella

2079 Last modified by the author on 27/10/2017 - 11:17
[Thermal atlas] Major enhancements made to the Heat Roadmap Europe energy planning tool

Heat Roadmap Europe (HRE) added major new features to its energy planning tool, the perfect basis for European governments, businesses, consultants, academics, and planners to make informed decisions about investments in energy efficiency measures and use of untapped alternative energy sources for heating and cooling.

The tool will also support the implementation of European climate commitments, ensure wiser investment of public money, reduce costs for consumers, and cut carbon emissions and energy consumption.

The free interactive Pan-European Thermal Atlas (Peta4), assesses heating and cooling demand, efficiency, and supply across Europe, supporting cities and industry in their efforts to decarbonise the heating and cooling sector. Peta4.2 incorporates various innovative new features: users can search for a specific location, select and combine up to ten layers of information, creating a detailed picture of where heating networks and low-carbon technology solutions could be implemented, whether they are economically viable, and how new networks could meet current heating and cooling demand.

Some of the new categories that the maps display include: a distribution costs layer that identifies areas where district heating infrastructure investments are most cost-effective;  renewable resources layers that show regional and local potential for carbon-free sources, including geothermal, solar, and biomass sources; and a Heat Synergy Regions layer that compares heat demand with nearby sources of excess heat in a defined area, thereby helping to identify regional planning priorities.

Heat Roadmap Europe 4 is a Horizon2020 EU-funded project mapping and modelling the heating and energy systems of the 14 largest users of heat in the EU, to develop new policies at local, national, and EU level to ensure the uptake of efficient, sustainable and affordable heating and cooling solutions.

Peta4 covers the 14 EU member states that are participating in the Heat Roadmap Europe project. Developed by project partners at Halmstad University, European University Flensburg, and Aalborg University, the maps use openly accessible spatial geo-data from the European Commission, the European Environmental Agency, and Eurostat.

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