Below the surface, inside the sewer there is a hidden and rarely used energy source. This is the communal sewage water.
The temperature of communal wastewater (collected and channeled through the sewage system) is stable and in average between 10-20°C. Since the technological efficiency of heat pumps depends on the temperature of the heat source, wastewater is one of the most ideal heat sources to feed heat pumps. Utilizing sewage as an energy source is not a completely new idea, however until now, there has not been a technology developed to harness it economically, especially on a bigger scale. The Hungarian THERMOWATT Ltd. has developed a technological solution to harness and utilize energy resided in wastewater to heat and cool buildings in a modern, environmental friendly and economical fashion.
In the Heat4Cool project one of the main objectives is to harvest energy from wastewater of block of buildings with integrated high performance and cost effective heat recovery technology. Therefore we aim to optimize the heat exchanger -as it is a key element of the technology- and later take advantage of this low grade thermal energy source by means of integration with Heat4Cool solutions. This advance will maximize heating and cooling technologies’ performances scaling up their scope.
Thermowatt has been developing/operating wastewater utilising heating and cooling systems and therefore have gained valuable knowledge. Joint efforts will be dedicated to the improvement and development of new heat exchanger and relate system components to achieve the project goal.
The developed and improved new heat exchanger will be installed in District 4 (Budapest) in order to optimize the heat recovery from sewage water. The district requirements and technical design will be taken into account to provide a planning of an executive implementation with cost-benefit and environmental analysis.