About the city
Uman is a city located 220 km to the south from the Capital of Ukraine, in the Cherkasy Oblast, and is the home to 85,000 people.
The district heating company “MC UmanTeploEnergo” is a fully municipally-owned company and the only district heating provider in the city. It operates 11 gas-fired boiler houses and six coal-fired boiler houses. For ten years, no domestic hot water has been supplied from the district heating systems in the city. The largest network is supplied with heat from a former CHP plant which supplies about 60% of the total district heating in Uman and has a capacity of 200 Gcal/h.
Uman Demonstration Project – overview
The proposed project concerned the introduction of biomass district heating generation in a remote district of the main district heating system in Uman. All buildings in the district were connected to the upgraded network via individual heating substations and a significant part of the main transmission pipeline, in bad condition and oversized, was taken out of operation or replaced by new pipes.
The project proposed by the company was interesting from a demonstration point of view. The primary reason for this was that the investment covers a substantial modernisation of the system. It reduced the use of fossil fuels in the system and enabled the possibility to operate the local district heating system as a fully demand-driven and modern system.
By including the introduction of IHS, the system was converted to a fully demand-driven system with possibilities for future energy efficiency measures on the customer level. This increased the quality of heat delivery to the connected buildings by enabling a heat supply in relation to actual heat demand.
The demonstration project was considered to have significant social values, for example:
- The district for upgrading was not supplied with heat during the full duration of the heating season and in addition, the heat provided was not sufficient to maintain sufficient indoor temperature. This has been improved with the demonstration project.
- A school was connected to the upgraded heating system. Previously, the school was heated by a local coal boiler, which implies sanitary problems.
- About two kilometres of the main transmission pipeline had constant leakages, and the leakages themselves as well as the constant excavation and repair works created problems for people living in the neighbourhood.
Uman Demonstration Project – details
The project area was situated in a remote area in Uman supplied with district heating from the central boiler house via a 7.2 km transmission pipeline. This system supplied 7 residential buildings, 1 dormitory and 3 public buildings. It has been possible to connect to the upgraded system a school which was heated by an individual coal-fired boiler and had led to demands of closing down due to sanitary reasons. Hence, this project has led to the continued operation of the school.
Specifics of the Uman Project included:
- Installation of a base-load biomass boiler (1×1.5MW) and two peak-load gas boilers (2×1.5MW)
- Individual Heat Substations – Introduction of 14 IHSs for the Sadova 26 district.
- Network replacement – 1,149m district heating pipes.
- Transmission pipeline replacement by pre-insulated pipes – approx. 700m.
- Decommissioning of 1,200m of the main transmission pipe in bad condition.
The proposed investment was EUR 970,000. The proposed financing plan was as follows:
- Total loan – EUR 500,000 (51.5%)
- Total grant – EUR 300,000 (31%)
- Total Uman local contribution – EUR 170,000 (17.5%)
Once implemented, the project will benefite the local community by:
- Saving 4,710 MWh heat per year
- Saving 1,120 000 m³ gas per year
- Saving 2,140 m³ water per year
- Saving 2,320 tonnes CO2 per year
Current status
Despite the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the implementation of the DemoUkrainaDH project in Uman is continuing. The new biomass boiler and the individual heating substations in the project district were commissioned and so were the renovated transmission pipes leading to the district. The project was completed and the distribution network in the project district was renovated.
Photo credit: city administration