Science City stores heat in the ground | OurWorld 2.0

Science City stores heat in the ground | OurWorld 2.0

A groundbreaking project is currently being implemented on the Hönggerberg Campus of renowned Swiss Federal Technical Institute, ETH Zurich. In the future, waste heat from buildings on the Science City Campus will be stored in the earth during the summer through 800 ground probes.
The same heat in a “refined” form will be reused for heating in winter. The manufacturers are convinced that the new energy concept will revolutionise the running costs of buildings in Switzerland.

Construction began in June behind the chemistry building on the Science City Campus, but below ground for once, not above ground. The first two ground heat storage fields for a sustainable heat supply network on the campus are currently being constructed here and under the new Life Science Platform building in the northeastern part of the campus.

There are 100 ground probes (200 metre-long plastic pipes) at the chemistry building and 130 behind another of the campus’s buildings. The pipes are sunk into the ground at five metre intervals, then connected to the building’s supply network. The plan is for 800 of these pipes to be located underneath and alongside the Science City buildings by 2020. Together with other structural measures, these will enable energy to be managed on the campus with almost no CO2 emissions, as stipulated by the ETH Zurich Energy Strategy.