Power-to-heat plant for Mümmelmannsberg commissioned

GETEC operates two combined heat and power plants (CHP) in Mümmelmannsberg, which supply around 7,000 apartments and commercial units with heat and electricity simultaneously. The CHPs had already been operated beforehand to serve the power grid in the sense of sector coupling. They produced electricity when it was needed in the grid on days with little wind and sun, and they were shut down by the distribution grid operator when no additional electricity was needed. The new PtH plant, with a capacity of 5 MW, allows excess renewable electricity to be converted into emission-free district heating for heating and hot water in an electrode boiler during periods of high wind when overloads also occur in the transmission grid. The CHP and PtH systems are coordinated with each other using intelligent control technology. The investment costs of 1.2 million euros were fully covered by 50Hertz. "

The energy transition in the building sector will only succeed if resources are optimized and used efficiently - and where they are needed. With one of the first PtH projects for a housing estate in a metropolitan area, GETEC and 50Hertz are meeting precisely the criteria that are necessary for the successful implementation of the energy transition. The CHP and PtH plant work in a grid-serving manner and relieve the power grid, there are no unnecessary costs for the shutdown and remuneration of EEG plants, and at the same time the people in Mümmelmannsberg are supplied with climate-friendly heat," explains Michael Lowak, Segment CEO Real Estate Business at GETEC Group.

"Around 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in Germany are currently attributable to the supply of heat to buildings. Therefore, in the future, the intelligent interaction between electricity generation based on renewable energies on the one hand and heat supply on the other will be a key issue on the way to climate neutrality. The conversion of electricity into heat is an economically and ecologically sensible technology for sector coupling when there is an oversupply of electricity from renewables," explained Dirk Biermann, Managing Director Markets and System Operations at 50Hertz.

The cooperation is based on a 2017 amendment to the Energy Industry Act (EnWG). Since then, the legislator has granted transmission system operators the option of concluding a redispatch contract with a CHP plant operator for the construction as well as the operation of a PtH plant. Pursuant to §13 (6a) EnWG, surplus electricity is not to be subject to redispatch, but is to be transformed into heat with the help of PtH and used in this way. The grid expansion area of 50 Hertz includes the northern part of Lower Saxony as well as the federal states of Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein, Hamburg and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. 50Hertz has already concluded similar cooperation agreements with the municipal utilities of Neubrandenburg, Rostock, Parchim and Stralsund.

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