Dr. Amaia Bastero
Papers # 2014 Chicago
District heating networks are used to distribute the heat generated in a centralized location to residential and industrial areas. Today most of the district heating networks consist of steel insulated pipes. Flexible plastic pipes offer a suitable corrosion free alternative, with an easier and more cost effective installation. To ensure lifetime of plastic pipes operating under district heating conditions, sufficient testing needs to be performed to allow extrapolation to service conditions. Calculations of the pipe lifetime for different climate zones has been performed using weather forecasts and the real test data for flexible Polyethylene of Raised Temperature (PE-RT Type II) pipes.
The generation of electricity is often an inefficient process which generates significant energy losses. 1 The same holds true for other production processes which release a large amount of heat as a by-product. The fundamental idea behind district heating is to recycle this heat, and convert it into value by transporting it towards residential and industrial areas. Since the heat is generated in a centralized location, this is more efficient than generating the heat in each needed location. Additionally this is a key technology when phasing out direct use of fossil fuels for heating purposes in the near term, since the district heating may come not only from power or nuclear plants but also from waste incineration, biomass, geothermal or solar thermal sources.
