District and block heating applications offers good conditions for the use of solar thermal for existing buildings and there are a number of demonstration plants with ground-mounted as well as roof-mounted collector arrays. A major advantage is that the solar plant can be of considerable size that leads to lower specific costs. The largest solar district heating plant comprises 18.300 m2 of collector area (~10 MW thermal capacity). The main barriers to growth are low alternative fuel costs and lack of confidence for solar heating in thermal utilities. Once cost-effective seasonal heat storage will be widely available, large-scale applications will become more competitive, resulting in a strong increase of the potential for solar thermal.

Further information:

• Jan-Olof Dalenbäck of Chalmers University, Sweden, maintains an excellent overview of large-scale solar thermal systems - most of which are used for district heating.

Description: Collector field for district heating, Lienz, Austria Source: S.O.L.I.D. / ESTIF Format: 2480 x 2480, JPG (1,7 MB) Terms of use

Description: Collector field for district heating, Schwarzenegger arena, Graz, Austria Source: S.O.L.I.D. / ESTIF Format: 1869 x 1360, JPG (1,6 MB) Terms of use

Description: Solar plant combined with district heating, 10.000 m2, Kungälv Sweden Source: ARCON / ESTIF Format: 2160 x 1440, JPG (4,1 MB) Terms of use

Description: Solar heating and biomass plant, 5500 m2, Falkenberg, Sweden Source: ARCON / ESTIF Format: 2160 x 1440, JPG (3,4 MB) Terms of use

Description: Collector field for district heating, Eibiswald, Austria Source: S.O.L.I.D. / ESTIF Format: 1280 x 1024, JPG (0,9 MB) Terms of use

Description: Solar thermal district heating for passiv houses Source: Ritter Solar / ESTIF Format: 2362 x 1540, JPG (2,6 MB) Terms of use

Description: Solar heating and biomass plant, 4900 m2, Aeroeskøbing, Denmark Source: ARCON / ESTIF Format: 1704 x 2000, JPG (10 MB) Terms of use

Description: Europe's largest district heating solar plant, 20000 m2, Marstal, Denmark Source: ARCON / ESTIF Format: 1713 x 1800, JPG (10 MB) Terms of use

Description: 2520 kWth district heating in Rise, Denmark Source: Batec / ESTIF Format: 2910 x 1930, JPG (0,1 MB) Terms of use

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