Municipal heat turnaround: Bavaria's largest solar thermal plant
Published
Fig.: Naturstrom AG
NATURSTROM is expanding its largest local heating project to date in Markt Erlbach, Franconia. In future, the eco-energy supplier will supply more than 130 customers with sustainable and locally generated heat - not only households but also municipal buildings and a large commercial enterprise. On 2,400 m2 Bavaria's largest solar thermal plant is being built for this purpose.
In the current second construction phase, NATURSTROM is connecting more than 70 new heat consumers, including the largest customer, the honey bottler Breitsamer & Ulrich GmbH & Co. KG. The company is providing the land for an energy centre and Bavaria's largest solar thermal plant with an area of 2,400 m2 available.
"The current turbulence on the European energy markets shows that we in Germany absolutely have to make ourselves less dependent on imports of fossil fuels," says NATURSTROM CEO Dr Tim Meyer. "With the heating turnaround towards decentralised renewable energies, we are not only doing the climate a great favour, but also ourselves and our economy. The local heating supply in Markt Erlbach is a great example of how the changeover can succeed."
Since 2019, NATURSTROM has been supplying 40 consumers with ecological heat at long-term stable prices via a wood pellet heating centre. After completion of the second construction phase, the local heating network will be 6.4 kilometres long. In addition to numerous private households and the Breitsamer company, the heat consumers also include smaller businesses and municipal buildings such as the school, the indoor swimming pool and an event hall. "We are pleased that so many and such different players in Markt Erlbach want to be part of the local heat turnaround," says Meyer.
After connecting all consumers, the total heat demand in the network is around 5,350 megawatt hours (MWh) per year; by covering this demand from renewable sources, approx. 1,800 tonnes of CO2 saved. In addition to solar heat, NATURSTROM uses wood pellets from the region as fuel in the existing energy centre, and regional wood in the form of wood chips will also be used in the second energy centre once the second construction phase is completed. "With the raw material supply from the region, we can provide affordable and sustainable energy for our citizens in the long term. Especially for future generations, it is important to act decisively for climate protection," emphasises Markt Erlbach's First Mayor Dr Birgit Kreß.
The two energy centres and the local heating network are designed to be open to new technologies, so that modernisation and expansion to supply new consumers are possible.
The impetus for planning the local heating supply came from a renovation of the main street. The connection to the local heating network will mainly replace old, climate-damaging oil heating systems. Particularly due to the lack of gas supply infrastructure, more than 80 percent of the inhabitants in Markt Erlbach still used heating oil before the start of the first construction phase.
Net public electricity generation reached a record share of 59.7 per cent in 2023. The share of the load was 57.1 per cent. This is the result of an analysis presented today by the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE. New records were set for wind and solar power in 2023. In contrast, generation from lignite (-27 per cent) and hard coal (-35 per cent) fell sharply. Photovoltaics stood out in the expansion of generation capacity: at around 14 gigawatts, the expansion was in double digits for the first time and significantly exceeded the German government's statutory climate protection target. Source of the data is the platform energy-charts.info
Photovoltaic systems generated approx. 59.9 TWh in 2023, of which 53.5 TWh was fed into the public grid and 6.4 TWh was used for self-consumption. At around 9 TWh, June 2023 was the month with the highest solar power generation ever. The maximum solar output of 40.1 GW was reached on 7 July at 13:15, which corresponded to a 68% share of electricity generation. In 2023, the expansion of photovoltaics significantly exceeded the German government's targets: instead of the planned 9 gigawatts, 13.2 gigawatts were installed by November; according to preliminary data, this will be more than 14 gigawatts by the end of 2023. This is a sharp increase compared to 2022 (7.44 GW). This means that PV expansion in Germany has reached double digits for the first time.
The Hydropower increased from 17.5 TWh in 2022 to 20.5 TWh. The installed capacity of 4.94 GW has hardly changed compared to previous years.
The Biomass at 42.3 TWh was at the level of 2022 (42.2 TWh). The installed capacity is 9 GW.
In total, the renewable energies approx. 260 TWh in 2023, around 7.2 per cent more than in the previous year (242 TWh). The share of renewable energy generated in Germany in the load, i.e. the electricity mix that actually comes out of the socket, was 57.1 per cent compared to 50.2 per cent in 2022. In addition to net public electricity generation, total net electricity generation also includes in-house generation by industry and commerce, which is mainly generated using gas. The share of renewable energies in total net electricity generation, including the power plants of "businesses in the manufacturing, mining and quarrying sectors", is around 54.9 per cent (2022: 48.2 per cent).
The Load in the electricity grid totalled 457 TWh, around 26 TWh less than in 2022. Due to the high electricity prices and higher temperatures, electricity was probably saved significantly. The increase in self-consumption of solar power is also reducing the load. The load includes the electricity consumption and grid losses, but not the pumped-storage power consumption and the self-consumption of conventional power plants.
Sharp decline in coal-fired power
After German coal-fired power plants ramped up their production in 2022 - due to the outage of French nuclear power plants, but also due to the distortions in the electricity market caused by the war in Ukraine - their share fell significantly in 2023. As a result, generation in November 2023 was 27 per cent below the same month in the previous year due to the drop in coal-fired electricity exports, but also because of the good wind conditions.
Overall, production from Lignite for public electricity consumption fell by around 27 per cent, from 105.9 to 77.5 TWh. This is in addition to 3.7 TWh for industrial own consumption. Gross electricity generation fell to the level of 1963.
Net production from Hard coal-fired power plants for public electricity consumption was 36.1 TWh (-35 per cent) and 0.7 TWh for industrial own consumption. It was 21.4 TWh lower than in 2022. Gross electricity generation fell to the level of 1955. Natural gas for electricity generation remained slightly below the previous year's level at 45.8 TWh for public electricity supply and 29.6 for industrial own consumption. Due to the shutdown of the last three nuclear power plants in Emsland, Neckarwestheim and Isar on 15 April 2023, the Nuclear power only contributed 6.72 TWh to electricity generation, which corresponds to a share of 1.5 per cent.
Battery storage systems are developing rapidly
The expansion of fluctuating renewable energies also increases the need for grid expansion and storage capacity. Battery storage systems, which are installed on a decentralised basis to buffer the generation of wind and solar power, are particularly suitable. The private household segment is showing strong growth, as is the case with photovoltaic systems. Overall, installed battery capacity almost doubled from 4.4 GW in 2022 to 7.6 GW in 2023, while storage capacity rose from 6.5 GWh to 11.2 GWh. The capacity of German pumped storage plants is around 6 GW.
Declining exports and exchange electricity prices
After an export surplus of 27.1 TWh was achieved in electricity trading in 2022, an import surplus of 11.7 TWh was recorded in 2023. This was due in particular to the lower electricity generation costs in neighbouring European countries in the summer and the high costs of CO2-certificates. The majority of imports came from Denmark (10.7 TWh), Norway (4.6 TWh) and Sweden (2.9 TWh). Germany exported electricity to Austria (5.8 TWh) and Luxembourg (3.6 TWh).
In winter, electricity exchange prices rose again and CO2-certificates became more favourable. This already led to a balance in November and, in conjunction with high wind power generation, to export surpluses in December. In contrast to its neighbouring countries (Austria, Switzerland, France), Germany also has sufficient power plant capacity in winter to produce electricity for export.
The average volume-weighted day-ahead price Exchange electricity price fell sharply to €92.29/MWh or 9.23 cents/kWh (2022: €230.57/MWh). This puts it back at the 2021 level.
A detailed presentation of the data on electricity generation, imports/exports, prices, installed capacity, emissions and climate data can be found on the Energy Charts Server: www.energy-charts.info/downloads/Stromerzeugung_2023.pdf
This first version of the annual evaluation takes into account all electricity generation data from the Leipzig electricity exchange EEX and the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSO-E) up to and including 31 December 2023. The quarter-hourly values from the EEX were energetically corrected using the available monthly data from the Federal Statistical Office on electricity generation up to September 2023. For the remaining months, the correction factors were estimated on the basis of past monthly and annual data. The extrapolated values from October to December are subject to larger tolerances.
This is based on the data for the German Net electricity generation to the public electricity supply. It is the difference between gross electricity generation and the power plants' own consumption and is fed into the public grid. The electricity industry calculates with net figures, e.g. for electricity trading and grid utilisation, and only net electricity generation is traded on the electricity exchanges. It represents the electricity mix that actually comes out of the socket at home.
Timber construction creates living space in the city
In the article, Susanne Jacob-Freitag presents the tallest and largest timber buildings worldwide, as well as the unique selling point of timber buildings in urban areas and their cost advantages.
Since January 2017, building owners who have a residential building constructed and certified in accordance with the requirements of the DGNB have the opportunity to receive a grant for construction support from KfW. This covers 50 percent of the eligible costs up to a maximum of 4,000 euros per building project.
The grant is linked to the KfW product "Energy-efficient construction and refurbishment" and can relate to various services within the scope of DGNB certification, such as auditor services, specialist planning and the performance of measurements of indoor air quality or air tightness.
Housing construction has great potential to contribute to resource conservation. For this reason, NRW.BANK supports developers with a new additional loan under the state's housing promotion programme.
Wood as a building material already contributes to climate protection during the construction of a building. This is why the Ministry of Home Affairs, Municipal Affairs, Building and Equality has introduced a new additional loan for construction projects with a high wood content in the context of its housing promotion programme. Regardless of whether the project involves the construction of a new building or the modernisation of existing properties, NRW.BANK offers attractive development loans under the state's housing promotion programme to create affordable and modern housing.
Attractive low interest rates with high redemption discounts of 15 to 25 percent, and partial crediting against equity, as well as a long fixed interest rate.
"Housing developers and investors who opt for a 30-year commitment period are now rewarded by the development bank for North Rhine-Westphalia with an even higher redemption discount of an additional 5 percentage points. For special aspects - such as building with wood - the repayment discount is even 50 percent. In addition, the initial interest rate on the development loans is now uniformly 0.0 percent in NRW for a period of 15 years. In modernisation promotion, building owners can now benefit from a repayment discount of up to 30 percent (regularly 20 percent) if they use certified ecological insulation materials or achieve an above-average energy standard."
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