Bloomberg
Summary
Helsinki is tapping an unexpected source of energy to heat its homes: cold water extracted from deep in the Baltic Sea.
The Finnish capital is joining Europe’s rush to find new sources of energy and reduce its reliance on imported fossil fuels with a new, carbon-neutral heating system. The city’s power company, Helen Oy, will partner with Spanish builder Acciona SA and local infrastructure company YIT Oyj to construct a tunnel for extracting water deep from the seabed, where it stays at a constant temperature. By processing the water through underground heat pumps, the system could generate enough heat to serve as much as 40% of the Finnish capital.
Currently, most homes in Helsinki are warmed via a district heating system that relies heavily on coal and natural gas to produce both power and heat. In 2021, fossil fuels accounted for more than 75% of the city’s district heat production. The seawater project is set to be a key step in the utility’s transition to renewable energy in order to meet Helsinki’s goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030 — a challenge for a cold-climate city with a large heating demand. Helen will use nuclear and renewable power for the electricity to run the system’s heat pumps; the company is already tapping waste heat from data centers and an ice-skating rink as additional sources of warmth.
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