Heat
More than half of South Tyrol's land area is covered by forest. For 30 years, this renewable resource has been used to generate heat and electricity. With 79 plants, South Tyrol has the highest concentration of biomass district heating plants in Italy. The biomass used in South Tyrol's heating plants comes mainly from our region. Many plants in rural areas even use exclusively local wood. Less than 20 per cent of the fuel is imported from neighbouring countries or Trentino.
This creates local economic cycles: forest owners, farmers and sawmills supply wood chips and round timber – and in their home communities, the ‘green’ heat then ‘flows’ to households and businesses. Common good and democratic participation: most of the biomass-fired plants in South Tyrol are organised as public utilities since their inception. Numerous customers are members of an operating cooperative and thus co-owners of ‘their’ district heating plant. District heating produced from biomass replaces wood-burning stoves and oil and gas heating systems and reduces pollutant emissions, especially in the winter months. Filter systems prevent the emission of fine dust produced during combustion, keeping the air clean.
Unsightly facades, clunky concrete buildings? No, thank you! Biomass district heating plants are not grey energy factories. Many plants in South Tyrol blend perfectly into the Alpine landscape and are architectural highlights in their region.
Biomass district heating is crisis-resistant: Unlike oil and natural gas, local roundwood and wood chips are not traded on European energy exchanges. While the two most important fossil fuels became significantly more expensive on the international market in the summer of 2022 following the start of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, local purchase prices for wood chips and roundwood remained virtually unchanged during this period.
The wood burned in district heating plants travels an average distance from the sellers' storage facilities to the boiler that is equivalent to the distance between Bolzano and Merano. The contact persons are also available directly on site – and are not located in anonymous call centres. Another advantage: those who opt for district heating save on maintenance and repair costs, and the heat exchanger takes up less space in the basement than a heating system.
In step with the times: our district heating plants rely on innovative technical processes. This means that the systems can be enhanced and optimised by replacing boilers and installing monitoring systems. The resulting increase in efficiency and consolidation of the existing networks are essential to securing the future of “green” heat.
Italy has 434 district heating networks, which mainly run on fossil fuels. There are 79 heating plants in South Tyrol, 65 of which burn almost exclusively wood chips, 87 % of which come from wood processing or forestry in South Tyrol. 23,000 households and businesses throughout the region are connected to these networks. This means that around 100,000 people in our province, or one fifth of the population, receive district heating. That's good – but not good enough. By way of comparison, district heating currently covers 45 per cent of national heating demand in Finland and as much as 66 per cent in Denmark.
This creates local economic cycles: forest owners, farmers and sawmills supply wood chips and round timber – and in their home communities, the ‘green’ heat then ‘flows’ to households and businesses. Common good and democratic participation: most of the biomass-fired plants in South Tyrol are organised as public utilities since their inception. Numerous customers are members of an operating cooperative and thus co-owners of ‘their’ district heating plant. District heating produced from biomass replaces wood-burning stoves and oil and gas heating systems and reduces pollutant emissions, especially in the winter months. Filter systems prevent the emission of fine dust produced during combustion, keeping the air clean.
Unsightly facades, clunky concrete buildings? No, thank you! Biomass district heating plants are not grey energy factories. Many plants in South Tyrol blend perfectly into the Alpine landscape and are architectural highlights in their region.
Biomass district heating is crisis-resistant: Unlike oil and natural gas, local roundwood and wood chips are not traded on European energy exchanges. While the two most important fossil fuels became significantly more expensive on the international market in the summer of 2022 following the start of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, local purchase prices for wood chips and roundwood remained virtually unchanged during this period.
The wood burned in district heating plants travels an average distance from the sellers' storage facilities to the boiler that is equivalent to the distance between Bolzano and Merano. The contact persons are also available directly on site – and are not located in anonymous call centres. Another advantage: those who opt for district heating save on maintenance and repair costs, and the heat exchanger takes up less space in the basement than a heating system.
In step with the times: our district heating plants rely on innovative technical processes. This means that the systems can be enhanced and optimised by replacing boilers and installing monitoring systems. The resulting increase in efficiency and consolidation of the existing networks are essential to securing the future of “green” heat.
Italy has 434 district heating networks, which mainly run on fossil fuels. There are 79 heating plants in South Tyrol, 65 of which burn almost exclusively wood chips, 87 % of which come from wood processing or forestry in South Tyrol. 23,000 households and businesses throughout the region are connected to these networks. This means that around 100,000 people in our province, or one fifth of the population, receive district heating. That's good – but not good enough. By way of comparison, district heating currently covers 45 per cent of national heating demand in Finland and as much as 66 per cent in Denmark.
