The use of unavoidable waste heat is considered an important building block for the decarbonization of industrial process heat and district heating. As part of a meta-analysis, scientists at the Wuppertal Institute have investigated the extent to which waste heat could be used and for which applications: Waste heat could play a significant role in achieving climate neutrality by 2045, particularly in district heating generation.
In their article, the researchers summarize the results of a meta-analysis on the role of waste heat in various climate protection scenarios for Germany. The meta-analysis is based on eight national scenario studies. In addition, a European climate protection scenario is considered as an example. Based on the results of the analysis, the authors describe the qualitative and quantitative statements on the provision and use of waste heat. It becomes clear that the topic of waste heat utilization is currently rather underrepresented in the study landscape: There are only a few quantitative statements on waste heat in the studies examined. Qualitative statements, however, indicate that waste heat will become increasingly important in the future: The consensus is that large heat pumps with ambient and waste heat as heat sources will play an important role in the decarbonization of district heating. In industry, waste heat utilization is currently seen primarily as a classic energy efficiency measure for industrial processes, but new applications are also on the rise, according to the authors.
