This discussion is locked.
You cannot post a reply to this discussion. If you have a question start a new discussion

How streaming videos gives a Danish city hot water

Here's an interesting video about a city in Denmark that uses heat generated by datacentres to heat hot water which is then used to heat homes. 

Apparently 'district heating' is a common concept in Scandinavia so why can't it be used here in the UK too? Or is it already? 

  • There is some district heating in the UK, but not much. District heating, when it does exist, is generally hated by the users who invariably consider that they are paying too much.

    In the UK, a better use of this waste heat might be premises that use a great volume of hot water, hotels, hospitals, industrial laundries, heated bathing pools, and large greenhouses come to mind.

  • Mostly because people in the UK don't like being ripped off by district heating companies (or the prospect of being ripped off).

    The price of electricity and gas in the UK is regulated by Ofgem.  The price if district heating isn't regulated at all.

    Landlords don't want the responsibility of maintaining district heating systems, so they outsource the work to other companies.  The companies bill the tenants directly, so the bills aren't the landlord's problem.  This means that the heating maintenance companies have no incentive to keep the bills down.

  • On the big island where I live district heating is quite common and usually fairly small scale. Our village has a central unit run by the village authorities which burns wood waste from the local forestry operations.

    This supplies the heating and hot water for our 2 bedroom 80 m2 apartment. Total bill July 2021 to June 2022 CHF 860 (£740). Electricity is CHF 40 (£35) a month. I usually get a rebate at the end of the year. Good insulation is most important.

  • I think there is the domestic housing estate in Slough that receives its CH hot water from the local power station supplying power to the trading estate. Personally, on an aesthetic level, I'd have preferred to have seen 200ft cooling towers, but I can see the logic of using all the surrounding dwellings as a heat exchanger (method of heat dispersal)

  • Interesting link Lisa. It reminded me of the how in some parts of London they use the heat from the Tube to do something similar: 

    And E&T wrote an article about it a few years ago. So, whilst it does seem like a pretty good idea, it doesn't seem to have been widely adopted in the UK.

  • Pimlico used to be heated from Battersea power station but most modern power stations are on the coast and waste the heat into an estuary or sea which is really unnecessary if there is a block of flats that needs heating nearby to sell the warm water to.