MAKING DISTRICT HEATING VISIBLE WITH IOT

The number of homes that is connected to district heating is growing rapidly. Even though this increase is in line with the energy and climate goals, there are still some obstacles to be overcome. Heat meters are not very transparant. Aurum applies its’ IoT energy solution to measure energy data from heat meters. This data is very useful for energy companies and housing corporations. They can use the collective consumption data to better procure heat volumes and to establish better relationships with the customers on their heat networks.

Heat meters are not always easy to monitor. This is is a problem for the owner of the heat network, the housing corporation and the energy supplier. They have to cope with:

Questions from customers about their heat consumption and annual bill
Local communities worried about the lack of transparency around heat consumption
No good overview of collective heat volume and expected heat consumption

A lot of housing corporations have houses with district heating in their portfolio. Housing corporation Eigen Haard has ambitious goals when it comes to retrofitting their buildings. Eigen Haard also wanted to provide their customers with direct insight in their homes’ energy consumption, including district heating. The housing corporation was looking for a way to gain higher transparency about the energy currents in their buildings. Aurums real-time energy monitoring solution provided an answer. Both consumers and the corporation benefit form real-time energy feedback. The inhabitants could directly see their homes’ energy currents and the corporation gained important collective data on (heat) consumption in their housing portfolio.

Giving a combined insight in solar, net metering, electricity consumption ánd district heating is quite unique in the Netherlands

The heat in this Amsterdam neighborhood is delivered through the heat network operated by Nuon. Never before were electricity consumption, solar panel production, net metering and district heating combined in one energy app. The heat meters were equipped with Aurums data communication technology based on RS 323. The data from the heat meters is made visible through the Aurum app and the collective heat data is stored on our Energy Data Platform. The housing corporation is able to monitor the collective heat demand of their buildings thanks to Aurums reporting.

The Aurum IoT solution for heat meters enables housing corporations to:

Get an improved vision of the collective demand of heat in a certain street, block or neighborhood. This gives the managers the tools to review the energy performance of groups of buildings.
Provide customers with transparency about their own heat consumption. This prevents energy wastage and decreases the possibility of bill shock. Making energy visible for inhabitants of corporation owned homes is a positive driver for the relationship between the corporation and its customers.

Deploying IoT to monitor and visualize district heating and individual heat meters will take a central place in the changing energy landscape.

“By providing inhabitants with valuable information, we give them the tools to get in charge of their own energy consumption”

Jurgen van de Laarschot, Woningcorporatie Eigen Haard