They use waste heat to reduce CO2 emissions from heating and cooling systems.

The Eurecat technology center is participating in the European LowUP project, which has developed and demonstrated three new heating and cooling technology solutions for buildings and industrial heat processes that reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and primary energy consumption by using renewable energy sources, residual energy sources, and improved energy management.

Currently, heating and cooling systems account for 50 percent of the European Union’s annual energy consumption, 85 percent of which comes from fossil fuels, mainly coal and natural gas.

Within the framework of the LowUP project, Eurecat’s Applied Artificial Intelligence Unit has led the development of a solution, called HP-LowUP, for improving industrial heat processes. Along these lines, and with the collaboration of several project partners, a new heat pump model has been integrated, “much more efficient and 100 percent thermal, powered by low-temperature residual energy sources, for application in industrial processes,” explains Unit Director Xavier Domingo. Furthermore, “we are working on the design of anomaly detection systems to improve process efficiency and prevent failures.”

Furthermore, for the two building HVAC solutions created within the project, one for cooling and the other for heating, Eurecat has been responsible for developing an intelligent and predictive control system for these HVAC systems, “integrating historical and real-time data from each solution’s systems, weather forecasts, and the buildings’ thermal models into the control process,” Domingo adds.

This dataset feeds an energy optimizer developed by Eurecat’s Waste, Energy, and Environmental Impact Unit, “which returns the best operating points for each system, and which intelligent monitoring then periodically communicates to the control of each piece of equipment and adapts to the actual needs at any given time,” says the Unit’s director, Frederic Clarens. A monitoring and anomaly detection system for each piece of equipment involved in the solutions has also been implemented for these air conditioning systems.

The LowUP project is funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 program and involves the participation of 13 partners from seven European countries.