Heatmap of Spain | Idae

The IDAE has launched the Heat Map. This tool makes it possible to locate on the map of Spain the estimated demands for heat and cold from consumers in all sectors of activity, as well as the installations that can generate residual heat or cold, including those that use energy from renewable sources.

Thanks to this information, the Administrations responsible for energy policy at a national, regional and local level, and promoters of energy projects, can identify areas with technical potential to carry out efficient heating and cooling projects.

The heat map is part of the obligations that article 14 of Directive 2012/27/EU on Energy Efficiency, in its Annex VIII, establishes for the Member States to carry out an evaluation of the potential use of heating systems and efficient refrigeration, in accordance with Delegated Regulation 2019/826. In the event that this evaluation determines the existence of potential, whose advantages exceed its costs, the States must adopt the necessary measures to carry out efficient heating and cooling infrastructures using residual heat and energy from renewable sources.

In this way, the map includes:

a) the areas of demand for heating and cooling, according to consistent criteria to focus on the energy density areas of the municipalities,

b) existing and planned installations that can generate waste heat or cold:

• Thermal installations for the generation of thermal power greater than 50 MW
• Cogeneration installations with thermal power greater than 20 MW
• Waste incineration plants
• Installations that use renewable energy sources with thermal power greater than 20 MW
• Industrial installations with thermal power greater than 20 MW

c) Existing and planned heating and cooling networks.

Knowing exactly the thermal energy demands of the different consumers allows us to adequately size the projects to be developed in order to take advantage of the available resources and obtain the greatest economic and environmental benefits.

Therefore, advancing in the development of the potential of efficient heating and cooling will serve to reduce our energy dependence since it will significantly reduce the demand for fossil fuels by valuing residual heat that, otherwise, would not be used to meet heating and cooling demands. economically justifiable.

It should be noted that the data used to prepare this tool is the result of certain estimates and hypotheses, as there are no specific statistical data on heating and cooling demand in our country. Therefore, the use of the heat map does not prevent the carrying out of complementary studies in those areas where the realization of certain energy projects is studied.