WaterWarmth: Accelerating the transition towards sustainable heating and cooling based on collectivesurface water heat pump systems

The Interreg North Sea Programme Project WaterWarmth: Accelerating the transition towards sustainable heating and cooling based on collective surface water heat pump systems. WaterWarmth addresses challenges of European energy use in the heating and cooling sector focusing on Aquathermal energy. The project centers on studying and facilitating energy communities that are delivering energy transition, and is co-developing examples of cooperative AE solutions, integrated into the local context, with citizens from across the North Sea Region.

Heating and cooling are responsible for half of the EU’s final energy consumption and most of it is based on fossil fuels. A shift towards renewable energy sources (RES) presents an opportunity to reduce the EU’s energy requirements, carbon emissions, pollution and reliance on energy imports. Aquathermal energy uses thermal energy from water to provide sustainable heating and cooling for buildings.

The local nature of Aquathermal energy enables energy communities to take ownership of production and delivery in cooperative heating and cooling systems, stimulating local economic activities, keeping profits in the region, and enabling a socially just and inclusive energy transition. Cooperative heating and cooling solutions requires the presence of a grid and changes from gas infrastructure are costly. Additional challenges remain around citizen participation, integration of AE in the current built environment, environmental impacts, legal and governance barriers, securing project funds and bearing risks by energy communities.