Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require?

Juan Jerez Monsalves; Claire Bergaentzlé; Dogan Keles

doi:10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985

Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require?

Juan Jerez Monsalves^*, Claire Bergaentzlé, Dogan Keles

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Article in proceedings › Research › peer-review

Abstract

Data centers can support the energy transition by recovering their waste heat for their own heating uses or supplying it into district heating networks. However, despite the benefits and technological maturity, few such systems exist today, suggesting conditions undermining their practical implementation. This study evaluates, using the Danish context, how heat sale revenues from district heating affect the feasibility of waste-heat recovery for three different-sized data centers under selected conditions. The data center is modelled as a system comprising free-cooling, chillers, and heat pumps. Its operation is optimized to minimize cooling costs, including heat sales, considering techno-economic parameters, environmental conditions, the availability of district heating to accept the heat, and heat sale price. The results suggest that waste-heat recovery requires highly favorable conditions to be viable, including priority access to the district heating system, with up to 13% cost savings at the highest heat prices allowed by current regulation.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	Proceeedings of the 2023 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market (EEM)
Number of pages	6
Publication date	2023
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985
Publication status	Published - 2023
Event	19th International Conference on the European Energy Market - Lappeenranta, Finland Duration: 6 Jun 2023 → 8 Jun 2023 Conference number: 19

Conference

Conference	19th International Conference on the European Energy Market
Number	19
Country/Territory	Finland
City	Lappeenranta
Period	06/06/2023 → 08/06/2023

Series	International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM
ISSN	2165-4077

Keywords

Data centers
District Heating
Waste heat

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Access to Document

10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985

OpenUrl availability

Full text

Cool-Data: Cool-Data: Flexible Cooling of Data Centers
Dominkovic, D. F. (PI), Bergaentzlé, C. (Project Participant), Englmair, G. (Project Participant), Furbo, S. (Project Participant), Madsen, H. (Project Participant), Junker, R. G. (Project Participant), Brok, N. B. (Project Participant), Stefansen, R. (Project Participant) & Kokkegård, H. (Project Participant)
01/09/2020 → 29/02/2024
Project: Research

Cite this

@inproceedings{fa6ea1904d414a4396151ef15ccac57d,

title = "Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require?",

abstract = "Data centers can support the energy transition by recovering their waste heat for their own heating uses or supplying it into district heating networks. However, despite the benefits and technological maturity, few such systems exist today, suggesting conditions undermining their practical implementation. This study evaluates, using the Danish context, how heat sale revenues from district heating affect the feasibility of waste-heat recovery for three different-sized data centers under selected conditions. The data center is modelled as a system comprising free-cooling, chillers, and heat pumps. Its operation is optimized to minimize cooling costs, including heat sales, considering techno-economic parameters, environmental conditions, the availability of district heating to accept the heat, and heat sale price. The results suggest that waste-heat recovery requires highly favorable conditions to be viable, including priority access to the district heating system, with up to 13\% cost savings at the highest heat prices allowed by current regulation.",

keywords = "Data centers, District Heating, Waste heat",

author = "Monsalves, \{Juan Jerez\} and Claire Bergaentzl{\'e} and Dogan Keles",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2023 IEEE.; 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM 2023 ; Conference date: 06-06-2023 Through 08-06-2023",

year = "2023",

doi = "10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985",

language = "English",

series = "International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM",

booktitle = "Proceeedings of the 2023 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market (EEM)",

}

Monsalves, JJ, Bergaentzlé, C & Keles, D 2023, Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require? in Proceeedings of the 2023 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market (EEM). International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM, 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market, Lappeenranta, Finland, 06/06/2023. https://doi.org/10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985

Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require? / Monsalves, Juan Jerez; Bergaentzlé, Claire ; Keles, Dogan.
Proceeedings of the 2023 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market (EEM). 2023. (International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM).

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Article in proceedings › Research › peer-review

TY - GEN

T1 - Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating

T2 - 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market

AU - Monsalves, Juan Jerez

AU - Bergaentzlé, Claire

AU - Keles, Dogan

N1 - Conference code: 19

PY - 2023

Y1 - 2023

N2 - Data centers can support the energy transition by recovering their waste heat for their own heating uses or supplying it into district heating networks. However, despite the benefits and technological maturity, few such systems exist today, suggesting conditions undermining their practical implementation. This study evaluates, using the Danish context, how heat sale revenues from district heating affect the feasibility of waste-heat recovery for three different-sized data centers under selected conditions. The data center is modelled as a system comprising free-cooling, chillers, and heat pumps. Its operation is optimized to minimize cooling costs, including heat sales, considering techno-economic parameters, environmental conditions, the availability of district heating to accept the heat, and heat sale price. The results suggest that waste-heat recovery requires highly favorable conditions to be viable, including priority access to the district heating system, with up to 13% cost savings at the highest heat prices allowed by current regulation.

AB - Data centers can support the energy transition by recovering their waste heat for their own heating uses or supplying it into district heating networks. However, despite the benefits and technological maturity, few such systems exist today, suggesting conditions undermining their practical implementation. This study evaluates, using the Danish context, how heat sale revenues from district heating affect the feasibility of waste-heat recovery for three different-sized data centers under selected conditions. The data center is modelled as a system comprising free-cooling, chillers, and heat pumps. Its operation is optimized to minimize cooling costs, including heat sales, considering techno-economic parameters, environmental conditions, the availability of district heating to accept the heat, and heat sale price. The results suggest that waste-heat recovery requires highly favorable conditions to be viable, including priority access to the district heating system, with up to 13% cost savings at the highest heat prices allowed by current regulation.

KW - Data centers

KW - District Heating

KW - Waste heat

U2 - 10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985

DO - 10.1109/EEM58374.2023.10161985

M3 - Article in proceedings

AN - SCOPUS:85165229336

T3 - International Conference on the European Energy Market, EEM

BT - Proceeedings of the 2023 19th International Conference on the European Energy Market (EEM)

Y2 - 6 June 2023 through 8 June 2023

ER -

Economic feasibility of data center waste-heat integration into district heating: What does it require?

Abstract

Conference

Keywords

UN SDGs

Access to Document

OpenUrl availability

Fingerprint

Projects

Cool-Data: Cool-Data: Flexible Cooling of Data Centers

Cite this