The REPLACE project has produced numerous materials and actions that support households, but also professionals and political decision-makers in the climate-friendly heating transition. How the results are to be made available in compact form in the future was the topic of the last project meeting on 22 March 2023 in Brussels.
The project partners will prepare a report presenting the policy measures that they have developed and implemented in the project. Another report will deal with aspects such as gender, energy poverty, rebound and lock-in effects, which should be taken into account when designing climate-friendly heating exchange. Collective actions that can promote heating exchange and that were implemented in the project will also be summarized. These include, for example, the joint and thus cheaper purchase of heating systems or the establishment of a logistic centre or hub, respectively for various solid biomass assortments, thereby facilitating more uniform fuel qualities and favourable fuel prices for end consumers. The publicly available results will also include REPLACE conclusions for policy makers and a final report on the project results, the design of which was discussed at the meeting.
In the exchange with REPLACE project officer Ana Sin Bagues, the topic of air-air heat pumps and their suitability for the project regions was also discussed. The technology is part of the REPLACE matrices in Bulgaria. And it is part of a pre-feasibility assessment tool specifically developed by SDEWES for the North Macedonia pilot region. The tool is desiged to replace direct electricity heating systems by combining roof-top PV plants with decentral inverter heat pump solutions in existing larger-volume buildings developed. In colder climate regions like Austria, on the other hand, in some provinces air-water heat pumps which are even more efficient than air-air heat pumps are not eligible for one-off subsidies for existing buildings that want to switch away from oil or gas. And in Croatia and Slovenia, air-air heat pumps occasionally are used for cooling single rooms especially when combined with PV plants to lower electricity purchase costs. For heating in higher and colder regions, however, pellets have proven to be more suitable, according to the project partners. The REPLACE project comes to an end in April 2023. The compact reports on the topic of climate-friendly heating exchange will be published on the website, via social media and other channels.