In this blog post, we’re spotlighting how you can leverage Fluidit Heat to optimize district heating supply temperatures to balance energy efficiency and peak demand.
Understanding supply temperature
Supply temperature in district heating networks is a key factor in meeting fluctuating power demands and achieving optimal operational efficiency. A long-term trend in the district heating industry has been to lower the supply temperature. As a result, the network’s heat losses can be reduced, fuel consumption decreased, and overall system efficiency significantly improved.
There are still situations when higher supply temperatures are required or bring benefits for operating the system most efficiently. For optimal operation, timing is critical – higher power production, i.e., hotter supply temperatures, must be achieved exactly when the peak consumption hour occurs.
A fundamental constraint in network operation is that the supply temperature must remain high enough to provide sufficient heating for every customer and to ensure compliance with domestic hot water quality standards. During peak demand periods, the temperature must be increased to cover the power demand fully. However, such temperature increases cannot happen too rapidly due to expansion stresses in network materials. Therefore, careful planning and timing are essential.
Balancing low and high supply temperatures can be challenging, but modern modeling tools ensure that dynamic temperature control can be executed effectively.
Finding solutions
To prepare for these situations, operators can “charge” the network by using the water mass in the pipes as short-term storage ahead of the anticipated higher demand periods. By increasing the supply temperature in advance, the network acts as a buffer, avoiding rapid temperature increases. Additionally, when the electricity price drops, operators can take advantage of charging the network using electric boilers – even if the power demand does not require it at that moment. This way, other fuel costs can be reduced.
When optimizing the supply temperature in modern networks, numerous factors, constraints, and challenges must be addressed. As the networks evolve and become more complex, optimization becomes increasingly challenging, requiring advanced modeling tools.
How can we help?
Advanced simulation environments, such as Fluidit Heat, enable the testing of control strategies for lower-supply-temperature networks under various scenarios and conditions. This can be done either with offline models or through continuously running real-time models that predict and recommend optimal supply temperatures.
However, with Fluidit Heat, effective analysis and testing can be carried out using offline models alone. Well-developed scenario management enables a detailed comparison between different operational strategies and helps find the optimal solution.
With Fluidit Heat, operational strategies, such as charging the system ahead of peak demand periods, can be tested and visualized.
With the help of thermohydraulic network model simulations, operators can effectively manage the balance between low and high temperatures. It ensures that the benefits of charging the network with higher supply temperatures and maintaining hot water standards are balanced against the penalties of higher heat losses. At the same time, all the technical constraints, including pumping performance and pipe capacity, can be tested.
In the future, as district heating systems become increasingly integrated with various energy sources and smart control systems, dynamic supply temperature management will play an essential role in operating these flexible and efficient systems.
Contact us
If you are interested in using Fluidit software in your supply temperature optimization projects, please get in touch with us for more details! Reach us at sales@fluidit.com or fill out the contact form.