Low temperature hot water system
F. Hoffmann-La Roche Inc. (Roche; www.roche.com) wants to turn its heat supply CO2-free and independent of fossil fuels.
The Roche manufacturing site in Penzberg/Germany wanted to contribute to climate-change mitigation and started a project. Until now, all buildings were supplied with heat via three distribution networks: a) a steam network, b) a local heating network with 90 / 70°C, and c) a heat recovery network with 30 / 20°C. The heat is generated using natural gas, which is used in combined heat and power plants and steam boilers. The generation of steam and local heat is based on natural gas, which is used in cogeneration plants and steam boilers. The Heat Recovery Network was the focus of the conversion. Here, the flow temperature is raised from 30°C to 45°C by means of conversions and appropriate adjustments.
With the temperature of 45°C, the buildings can be heated directly and the existing steam humidification can be replaced by water humidification. The room air is also tempered via this new network. The temperature increase from 30 to 45 °C is achieved by converting two existing chillers, which in future will be operated as heat pumps entirely with renewable electricity. For this purpose, they use the process waste heat from power generation plants. These converted heat pumps have a COP value of 7, which is significantly higher than that of standardized heat pumps with a COP of 3 to 5" (COP = "coefficient of performance", i.e. heating power per electrical drive power). The use of waste process heat will also reduce the use of cooling towers.
This is expected to save 36,000 m³ of water and 18,200 MWh of electricity per year at this particular site, as well as the use of biocides. The annual CO2 savings are expected to be 1,737 t CO2 for 2023 to 2025, increasing by a further 2,171 t CO2 by 2029, bringing the total to 3,908 t CO2 from 2030 onwards.
Country
Germany
Name of Organization
GERMANY Roche Diagnostics GmbH, Penzberg/Germany
Further information
This initiative won this year the Responsible Care State Competition Bavaria (regional level):
https://www.bayerische-chemieverbaende.de/presse/rc-sieger2023/#1626794835767-c20ad1c2-d88d
And then the project went on to win the third price of Responsible Care Germany (this time on the national level):
https://www.vci.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/preistraeger-des-responsible-care-wettbewerbs-ausgezeichnet-top-im-energiesparen.jsp