Heating project in Prague to harness geothermal from subway tunnel
Nove Dvory, Prague, Czech Republic (source: Hynek Moravec, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)
Carlo Cariaga
30 Oct 2024
Nové Dvory in Prague, Czech Republic may soon have heating and cooling drawn from a geothermal system integrated in the nearby subway infrastructure.
The City Council of Prague in the Czech Republic has approved a plan that proposes the utilization of geothermal energy from a subway tunnel to provide heating and cooling for new buildings in the Nové Dvory neighborhood. Since the geothermal system will be part of the subway construction, there will be no drilling needed for the project.
Seventeen separate blocks of buildings will be built on an area of about 200,000 square meters in the Nové Dvory neighborhood. These buildings will have an estimated heating and cooling consumption of 10,000 to 15,000 MWh per year. Moreover, an administrative building with about 8000 square meters of space to be leased will also be built, requiring an additional 300 to 500 MWh per year of heating and cooling.
Under the proposed project, energy for heating and cooling in these buildings will be supplied by pipes built within the subway tunnel D in the vicinity of the Nové Dvory station. Fluid from these pipes will then go through a heat pump to attain the target design temperature. The proposal emphasizes that heat pumps provide unparalleled efficiency, producing 3 to 5 kWh of thermal energy from 1 kWh of electricity consumed.
The geothermal system is just one component of the planned sustainable and modern environment in the neighborhood, which aims to also provide affordable rental housing, a kindergarten and elementary school, cultural center, sport facilities, and public transport lines.
“The future Nové Dvory station is a deep-cut subway station. In this case, it pays to use geothermal energy to provide heat for the urban society. Not all metro stations would have such a potential, because perhaps they do not meet the necessary depth that is needed for similar projects,” said Jana Komrsková, deputy for the environment and climate plan.
“This is the first time that we are planning to obtain geothermal energy from the subway tunnel and use it for the production of heat or cold using a heat pump,” added Petr Hlavácek, deputy mayor responsible for territorial and strategic development.
Source: Komunalni ekologie
