Urbio | BEW funding by e-con
District Heating Planning
How e-con carries out BEW feasibility studies efficiently with Urbio
The German district heating contracting company e-con AG plans, develops and operates renewable heating networks. To cut costs in feasibility studies for district heating projects, e-con leverages Urbio to efficiently secure competitive funding from Germany’s BEW program (Federal Funding for Efficient District Heating Networks).
Customer
e-con
Sector
District Heating Developer
Location
Germany
Challenge
The e-con team recognized the significant opportunity presented by the German BEW program, which supports the development of efficient and climate-friendly district heating networks through funding for feasibility studies and transformation plans.
As such studies are typically very costly, subsidies can often make or break the realization of subsequent projects, covering 50% of costs in BEW Module 1. However, the application process, as well as the preparation of the feasibility or transformation studies, requires a meticulous compilation of technical specifications, energy demand projections, spatial analyses, and financial assessments. This process is very time-consuming due to the level of detail involved.
Solution
The team at e-con integrated Urbio into their workflow to address the specific requirements of the BEW process for feasibility studies. Urbio’s end-to-end planning suite enabled e-con to efficiently “tick-off” the key aspects demanded by the BEW program, including a detailed analysis of the existing energy system, the identification of potential heat sources and sinks, the calculation of heat demand and load profiles and an assessment of the economic viability and cost-effectiveness of the future district heating network.
Urbio really streamlined our BEW process. Instead of juggling multiple tools and spreadsheets, we had everything in one place.
— Niklas Koch, Project Engineer, e-con
| BEW Requirement | Urbio Solution |
| Detailed analysis of the current state | Data integration from various sources (GIS, Excel, CRM, open data), visualization of existing infrastructure, geospatial analysis of buildings to be supplied (building type, temperature level, heat supply type, system size, etc.) and heat density analysis (density lines, heat maps...). |
| Renewable & Waste Heat Potential | Spatial analysis tools to assess the potential for renewable energy sources and usable waste heat in the designated region. |
| Heat Generation | Analysis of heat generation systems, including variants to identify preferred and cost-effective heat supply (combination of heating system types, peak and base load heat systems, etc.). |
| Target analysis of the heating network | Comprehensive network design (main, branch, and house connection lines), grouping into supply clusters, analysis of network parameters (pipe diameter and length, flow/return temperature, pressure ratios, volume flows, heat supplied, number of clients, connection rate...). |
| Pathway to Net-Zero Heating Networks | Temporal scenario planning, allowing to evaluate various network configurations and renewable technology options for heat generation with milestones in 2030, 2035, 2040 and 2045. |
| Economic viability and cost-effectiveness | Cost modeling tools for infrastructure, operation, and maintenance, enabling the calculation of key economic indicators as well as the determination of an indicative heat price. |
| Citizen Engagement for Project Acceptance | Overview of measures for citizen engagement (including planning) aimed at achieving high acceptance levels to facilitate the rapid realization of the project. |
Benefits
Accelerated BEW Funding Acquisition
With Urbio’s AI-powered network design features, e-con dramatically reduced the time and effort required to prepare BEW funding applications. The automated data processing, spatial analysis, and reporting features enabled them to compile the necessary information in a fraction of the time previously needed. In this way, e-con can conduct a large number of feasibility studies and improve their efficiency and quality, and the number is growing all the time.
Reduced Risk in Asset Investments
Unlocking the subsidies for feasibility studies is just the means to an end, which is developing profitable and renewable heating networks. The financial resources ultimately allowed the team to conduct thorough studies for the implementation of the networks. By iteratively refining scenarios in Urbio with precise energy demands, client acquisition information, potential heat sources, and technical and economic data, e-con mitigates early-on the risk of costly miscalculations and suboptimal investment decisions in the subsequent implementation phases of the thermal network projects.
Urbio has improved the data management, the level of detail and the informative value of the feasibility studies and helped us to make well-founded decisions.
— Dominik Baur, Project Manager, e-con