Ternopil is located 367 km to the southwest from the capital of Ukraine and home to 217,000 people. It is an important administrative and cultural centre with an economy characterized by diversified industries including food, textile, pulp and paper and electronic equipment.
The Municipal Company “TernopilMiskTeploKomunEnergo” provides heat to approximately 85% of the city. The utility operates 40 boiler houses with an installed capacity of 650 Gcal/h. Almost all boiler houses use natural gas for the generation of heat.
Ternopil Demonstration Project – overview
The project involves the conversion of an existing gas boiler located in the boiler house into using biofuels. Furthermore, IHSs were installed in all the buildings connected to this boiler house. These investments make it possible to operate the district heating system as a fully demand-driven and modern system.
The project is interesting from a demonstration point of view as it involves the conversion of an existing gas boiler into a pellets boiler by installing new burners. This is a new technology in Ukraine and if it proves successful it could potentially have a great impact on the future use of biofuels in Ukrainian district heating systems as it introduces a cost-efficient way to convert existing gas boilers.
The introduction of IHSs in the area will increase the quality of heat delivery to the connected buildings by enabling a heat supply in relation to actual heat demand. Besides, in the project area, the installation of IHSs in all the buildings that are currently supplied with domestic hot water will make it possible to convert the existing pipe system and thus reduce heat losses, water losses and maintenance costs for the present domestic hot water pipelines.
Ternopil Demonstration Project – details
The project area included heating networks supplied from the boiler house. This boiler house primarily supplied space heating to the connected buildings and also supplied some consumers in residential buildings with domestic hot water. It supplied space heating, domestic hot water, and steam to a total of 47 customers, 10 of which were residential buildings. Apart from the residential buildings, an additional 27 budget and commercial customers were supplied with space heating, and an additional 7 contracts were related to domestic hot water, while 3 contracts referred to the supply of steam..
Specifics of the Ternopil Project included:
- Conversion of a boiler in the boiler house to biomass (4.5MW).
- Individual Heat Substations – Introduction of 25 IHSs.
The investment was EUR 739,169 EUR with a simple payback time of 1.9 years. The financing plan was as follows:
- Total loan – EUR 352,957 (48%)
- Total grant – EUR 271,212 (37%)
- Total Ternopil local contribution – EUR 115,000 (16%)
After implementation, the project benefited the local community by:
- Saving 8,510 MWh heat per year
- Saving 100,000 m³ gas per year
- Saving 10 tonnes CO2 per year
Current status
The project is successfully completed. All goods were procured, installed, and successfully commissioned. Loan completely paid off in 2022.
Photo credit: Anton Marchevskyi