Blogs

7 numbers that explain why the future of buildings is all-electric

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Canary Media Summary It might seem like a dicey time for building decarbonization in the U.S., where edifices and the energy they consume account for about a third of the nation’s annual carbon pollution.About 1 in 4 : States that have passed legislation related to thermal energy networksLawmakers in 13 states have approved bills that encourage gas utilities to reinvent themselves as utilities that provide carbon-free thermal energy instead of fossil gas. Some of these laws require gas companies to pilot thermal energy networks , which can decarbonize entire neighborhoods at once by replacing gas pipeline systems. Others unlock financing ...

Companies are finding creative ways to use heat from data centres

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Corporate Knights Summary When it comes to heat, data centres deliver a double whammy. These massive computing hubs generate a constant torrent of excess heat while simultaneously using vast amounts of power to get rid of it. An estimated 38% to 40% of energy used by data centres goes toward cooling. Heat waste from computing workloads is considered low-grade heat, meaning anything less than 100°C. “With low temperature grades,” says Amin Mohammadi, a PhD candidate at Simon Fraser University’s Laboratory for Alternative Energy Conversion, “converting that energy to thermal energy or cooling energy would be the best option that you have.” In other words, ...

Stora Enso completes Euro 30 million upgrade, cuts Heinola mill emissions by 90%

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
lesprom Summary Stora Enso has completed a Euro 30 million investment to renew energy infrastructure at its Heinola Fluting Mill in Finland, eliminating over 90% of the site’s greenhouse gas emissions. The project, finished in the final quarter of 2025, replaces solid fossil fuels with renewable bioenergy, cutting annual CO2 emissions by more than 113,000 tonnes, according to Stora Enso. The upgrade involved constructing a new fuel receiving station and conveyor system, alongside a major modernization of the mill's fluidized-bed boiler. The change also provides more environmentally friendly district heating for the city of Heinola. Continue Reading ...

Dresden gets one of the most powerful AI computers in Germany

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
DieSachsen Summary Artificial intelligence requires enormous computing power. TU Dresden is therefore planning a new supercomputer. "Deneb" is the name of the system with 184 high-performance chips, which is due to be launched at the end of 2026. Particularly sustainable: 97 percent of the computing heat flows into the district heating network and heats buildings in the surrounding area. Artificial intelligence has long been part of our smartphones, translating texts and recognizing faces in photos. But behind these everyday applications are huge computing machines that take months to learn. One such supercomputer is now being built at the Technical ...

Versailles, France to undertake geothermal transition of heating network

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Think GeoEnergy Summary The City of Versailles in France has signed a contract with Engie for the existing heating network to be transitioned partially to geothermal heating. The City of Versailles in the Yvelines Department in France has signed a contract with Engie for a 32-year concession that seeks to transform and modernize the local district heating network. The project will involve the drilling of a geothermal doublet which will supply 69% of the network’s heating requirements by 203o. The contract between the two parties was signed by Versailles Mayor François de Mazières and Engie Managing Director Franck Lacroix. The project will ...

From energy outposts to green pioneers: Europe’s islands show the way

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Youris.com Summary It began with a national competition in 1997. Denmark, shaken by the 1970s oil crisis and industrial job losses, had been on a mission to go green and transform its economy. Samsø, an island of 4,000 people off the Jutland Peninsula and reliant on coal and oil from the mainland, responded to the call to create a model community of green innovation and technology. “We were struggling with a loss of jobs and an ageing population, too few kids to maintain a good school system, a roaring urbanisation draining all the resources out of rural districts,” says Søren Hermansen, a farmer born and raised on the island. “So, we were fighting to avoid ...

Bitcoin’s Evolving Use Cases: Payments, Investments, and Now Heating?

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Gadget Review Summary Estimates suggest Bitcoin mining consumes between 91 and 176 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity each year. That’s nearly 0.5% of global electricity usage, roughly on par with entire countries like Norway or Poland. Unsurprisingly, these figures have drawn heavy criticism from environmental groups. But there is a lesser-known side effect of all that energy use: heat. Bitcoin mining generates substantial warmth, which until recently was simply wasted. If that byproduct could be captured and reused, it might serve as an alternative heat source—one that could help supplement traditional heating systems during the winter months. ...

Next-Generation Cities Institute leads global effort to set guidelines for sustainable district energy markets

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
University of Concordia Summary As cities race to cut emissions and reduce energy demand, Concordia’s Next-Generation Cities Institute (NGCI) has won an international competition to develop new District Energy (DE) Market Development Guidelines. District energy networks distribute heating or cooling across groups of buildings or entire neighbourhoods by drawing on clean sources such as geothermal heat, waste heat from industry or data centres and solar thermal energy. Launched by the International Energy Agency’s Technology Collaboration Programme on District Heating and Cooling , the project will provide governments and planners with guidance ...

How Renewable Energy Solutions Are Transforming Commercial Building Efficiency in 2025

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Apple Magazine Summary A paradigm shift towards smarter energy management is now underway, with Thermal Energy Networks (TENs) emerging as a transformative force. TENs are poised to redefine how we heat and cool our commercial spaces, offering a clear path to enhanced energy efficiency, reduced carbon emissions, and substantial long-term cost savings. By embracing these renewable energy solutions, we can create a built environment that is not only more comfortable and productive but also environmentally responsible. The concept of district energy has been around for over a century, with centralized plants distributing heat to multiple buildings. ...

Sustainable city: Alfa Laval plate heat exchangers repurpose waste heat from large cooling network into district heating

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Alfa Laval Summary Since 1997, more than 12,000 offices, 1,000 apartments, as well as numerous cultural institutions and hotels around Potsdamer Platz are connected to the cooling network of BEW Berliner Energie und Wärme GmbH (formerly Vattenfall Wärme Berlin) and supplied with locally generated cooling. The amount of waste heat generated in the process is considerable – and far too valuable to be released into the environment via cooling towers. n 2018, BEW and Siemens Energy therefore launched the ambitious Qwark³ (Quartiers-Wärme-Kraft-Kälte-Kopplung) project at the cooling centre at Potsdamer Platz. With the help of an industrial high-temperature heat ...

Challenges and Opportunities for DERs

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
POWER Summary Distributed energy resources (DERs) can take many forms. They include renewable energy such as solar and wind power, energy storage through batteries or other technologies, backup power generators, or even combined heat and power systems. Several energy industry experts recently spoke with POWER about how DERs are taking a larger role in power generation. Among them was Akshai Baskaran, VP and GM, Energy Management, for Gravity, a San Francisco, California-based company that helps enterprises and their supply chain partners manage their carbon footprint. The company addresses rising energy costs, grid instability, and decarbonization ...

Capstone Green Energy to Power First-of-Its-Kind 6.6MW Biogas Project at Renewable Energy Facility in North Carolina

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Financial Times Summary Capstone Green Energy Holdings, Inc. announced completing the installation of its 6.6-megawatt combined heat and power (CHP) microturbine system at a landmark renewable energy facility in North Carolina. This waste-to-energy project marks a meaningful step forward in the customer’s operational strategy by monetizing swine waste through a proprietary pyrolysis process to produce renewable biogas. Capstone’s microturbines will convert this on-site biogas into 100% renewable electricity for grid export, while simultaneously delivering high-value thermal energy to support the facility's internal operations. This integrated approach enhances ...

Spain unveils €405m support scheme for renewables and clean-tech manufacturing

By District Energy posted 6 hours ago
Strategic Energy Europe Summary Spain has launched two new funding calls totalling 405 million euros to advance its energy transition strategy, combining support for renewable energy deployment with measures to strengthen domestic industrial capacity in clean technologies. The first programme, RENOCogen , allocates 50 million euros to operators of cogeneration and waste-treatment plants seeking to replace fossil fuels—such as natural gas, diesel or fuel oil—with renewable energy sources. Continue Reading #News #CHP

New School of Social Work Building Takes Shape in Downtown Baltimore

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
University of Maryland-Baltimore Summary The new University of Maryland School of Social Work building is becoming more recognizable by the day with considerable construction that spanned 2025. Columns and walls have been poured; existing utilities relocated and new pathways for utilities to serve the building in place; and 42 geo-exchange wells drilled and pressure tested, through the entire 10 miles of piping. General contractor Whiting-Turner Contracting Co. captured every minute of the action with bird's-eye views from the southwest and northwest that anyone can stream online. Recently, Whiting-Turner shared a time-lapse of the construction ...

Ireland continues to cut emissions, but SEAI report shows effort must double to meet 2030 goals

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
seai Summary The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) today published the Energy in Ireland 2025 report, providing definitive national data on energy supply, demand, and related emissions up to the end of 2024, with provisional estimates for 2025. The report comes as Ireland nears the end of the first-ever national carbon budget and the midpoint of the crucial 2020 to 2030 decade, during which we are legally obliged to halve our emissions. Energy data from 1990–2024 shows we have made meaningful reductions in energy-related emissions for many years. But the same data highlights an urgent need to double-down on current efforts to tackle ...

Addressing the love/hate relationship with energy infrastructure

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
pbc today Summary It’s a curious quirk of modern placemaking: the same communities that campaign passionately to preserve our monumental cooling towers, redundant power stations, and other infrastructure often oppose, with equal fervour, the development of new homes or clean energy infrastructure. Could understanding this contradiction be the key to delivering both the homes and the power that modern society increasingly depends upon, and can we learn from the rare success stories? So, can we make our new energy infrastructure, wherever it is located, more aesthetically pleasing and perhaps more acceptable to the public? A good example is CopenHill or ...

Building the future: 2026 project milestones to celebrate

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
Buro Happold Summary Southwark Council’s ambition to cut carbon emissions and deliver affordable, secure heating to thousands of homes and businesses is a bold step toward a sustainable future. The Southwark 2.0 Heat Network expansion will extend the existing district heating infrastructure by 7km, connecting to the South East London Combined Heat and Power (SELCHP) facility. This initiative will provide reliable, low-carbon heat to around 5,000 additional homes and businesses, saving an estimated 14,000 tonnes of CO₂ annually – a significant contribution to London’s climate action goals. Continue Reading #News #CHP

Unlocking the Grid

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
New York Times Summary With demand for electricity set to surge amid a shifting energy mix, how the U.S. powers itself in the years ahead is critically important. How is power generated in the U.S. today, and how does this stand to change? Which parts of the country are most energy-hungry — and why? And how does a gargantuan four trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity get from one place to another? Scroll the map to travel coast to coast and discover the big picture of U.S. energy. Continue Reading #News #MemberNewsIDEA #SiemensSmartInfrastructure #Siemens

Ferrovial joins the Nasdaq-100 Index®, achieving new milestone in global growth

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
Ferrovial Summary Ferrovial , a leading global infrastructure company, today announced its inclusion in the Nasdaq-100 Index® , marking a significant milestone in its global growth strategy. This achievement comes one and a half years after the company’s initial listing on the U.S. stock market . “Ferrovial’s inclusion in the Nasdaq-100 highlights the strength of our distinctive integrated business model in delivering essential infrastructure . This milestone enhances our visibility with U.S. and global investors, broadens our shareholder base, and reflects market confidence in our ability to develop high-value projects that drive economic ...

Empower was recognised with the MAJRA Gold Impact Seal for its leading initiatives in Corporate Social Responsibility.

By District Energy posted 2 days ago
Zawya Summary Emirates Central Cooling Systems Corporation PJSC (Empower), the world’s largest district cooling services provider, has won the Gold Impact seal from the National CSR Fund (MAJRA), which is the highest federal recognition for sustainable practices in private companies, at the inaugural Impact Summit 2025 held in Abu Dhabi. The recognition reflects Empower’s enduring commitment to corporate social responsibility and its ongoing efforts to promote sustainable development in the UAE. Organised by MAJRA, under the theme “Unifying the Common Good of the Nation,” the summit attracted wide participation from ministers, senior officials, CEOs, social ...