D5.1 Integrated Hotmaps and THERMOS User Guide

Project Deliverable

The European Commission has identified heating and cooling (H&C) as one of the key action points to achieve the sustainability goals set for the next decades, specifically with regards to fossil fuel reduction and greenhouse gas emission targets. This is reflected in the amendment of the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) stating: “Member States shall encourage regional and local authorities to prepare local heating and cooling plans at least in municipalities having a total population higher than 50.000”. The Act!onHeat project aims to aid municipalities to improve their strategic H&C planning and to ensure this translates into tangible decarbonisation measures, such as district heating and cooling (DHC) networks. To do so, the project will use the THERMOS and Hotmaps tools, developed in previous H2020 projects, which provide several options for the identification, definition and optimisation of local decarbonisation measures.

• Hotmaps is aimed at supporting the planning process of the H&C sector at local, regional and national level. Hotmaps supports the analysis of various H&C demand reduction, resource potentials and supply and options for defined regions. It supports identification of areas with relevant potential for district H&C solutions and allows for the development of region wide future H&C scenarios.
• THERMOS focuses on the planning and optimization of local low carbon district heating or cooling networks. It supports analysis on the implementation of new networks in areas with potential, as well as expansion of existing networks and the optimization of the heat supply.

Both tools can provide several options with regards to low carbon supply solutions and their economic feasibility and can be used separately to provide relevant results. However, a methodology for their integrated use has been developed in order to maximize benefits to Act!onHeat participants and increase the project’s impact. This document aims to describe the integrated complementary use of both tools using a simplified approach. It provides an overview of the process and links to relevant information where a more detailed explanation can be found.

The content of this document should be considered a first approach to the integration of both tools and may evolve based on the users’ needs as well as additional synergies found between the tools as the project progresses.

D5.1 Integrated user guide