HAPPENING
Heat Pumps in existing multi-family buildings to achieve energy and environmental goals
| Business | Period | Project Coordinator | Funding Scheme |
|---|---|---|---|
| Energy | October 2020 - March 2024 | TECNALIA | H2020 |
Challenge
Nowadays, decarbonisation of existing buildings plays a key role in order to reach the overall climate and energy targets and heat pumps are a key technology to bring renewable shares into the heat supply of buildings.
However, there are several technical and non-technical challenges which currently hinder their implementation:
- High heat losses in the distribution pipes (both heating and Domestic Hot Water - DHW) additionally increasing the temperature level to be delivered by the heat generator, and thus its energy consumption;
- High temperature level requirements in the DHW system: in order to prevent legionella growth, high temperature levels in the DHW storage and distribution system must be guaranteed;
- Uncertainty about adequate system concepts for heat pumps in existing multi-apartment buildings resulting in high planning effort and a higher risk of installation and operation errors due to lack of knowledge and training;
- Uncertainty about actual system performance and operating cost due to lack of information on verified performance of heat pump systems in existing multi-apartment buildings;
- Higher initial cost in comparison to fossil-fuel based standard heating technology (gas / oil boilers);
HAPPENING has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 957007 to overcome all these challenges by demonstrating a highly versatile, scalable and replicable solution package for buildings heating and dhw system retrofitting allowing 70% of renewable energy fraction.
Approach
In the framework of HAPPENING, RINA is mainly in charge of the replication and exploitation of the project innovation.
Therefore, we are going to:
- catalyze the acceptance and use by the market of the HAPPENING products and ensure compatibility and interoperability with the buildings’ needs and requirements Develop Business and ESCO Model
- develop and promote innovative business models based on the ESCO models towards replication of HAPPENING and to convince future clients (public and private) on its convenience
- develop an E-Handbook with guidelines for integration of the solutions in public and private, tertiary and residential buildings
- evaluate project results standardization and nontechnological evidences to unlock the potential of project concepts
Conclusion
In conclusion, HAPPENING overall approach is based on providing an easy-to-install ‘solution package’ based on heat pumps to replace existing boilers in multi-family buildings, allowing installers and ESCOs do the retrofitting in an easy, reliable, cost-effective and qualified way as well.
In particular, the project system package to be developed consists of one synergic combination of these technologies:
- Packed decentralized heat pump systems
- PV panels
- Storage
- Smart control hardware and software
Other main impacts for the EU community will be:
- development of processes and tools to reduce the efforts and costs within the whole retrofitting project, from planning, to implementation and operation
- development of new financing and business models specific for building renovations
