IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v1y2009i3p494-515d5568.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Assessment of Global Emissions, Local Emissions and Immissions of Different Heating Systems

Author

Listed:
  • Johannes Henkel

    (Berlin University of Technology, Department of Energy Systems, Einsteinufer 25 (TA 8), 10587 Berlin, Germany)

  • Robert Kunde

    (Bavarian Center for Applied Energy Research, Division 1: Technology for Energy Systems and Renewable Energy, Walther-Meissner-Str. 6, 85748 Garching, Germany)

  • Matthias Gaderer

    (Bavarian Center for Applied Energy Research, Division 1: Technology for Energy Systems and Renewable Energy, Walther-Meissner-Str. 6, 85748 Garching, Germany
    Technical University of Munich, Institute for Energy Systems, Boltzmann Str. 15, 85748 Garching, Germany)

  • Georg Erdmann

    (Berlin University of Technology, Department of Energy Systems, Einsteinufer 25 (TA 8), 10587 Berlin, Germany)

Abstract

This paper assesses and compares existing and new technologies for space heating in Germany (e.g., heat pumps, and solar thermal and wood pellet systems) in terms of their environmental impacts. The various technologies were analyzed within the context of the new German legislation. The assessment was carried out on three levels: 1. Global emissions: a life cycle assessment was carried out in order to find the global environmental footprint of the various technologies; 2. Local emissions: the effects of local emissions on human health were analyzed; and 3. Immissions: the immissions were evaluated for the various technologies using a dispersion calculation. A special feature of this study is the substitution of frequently used database emission values by values obtained from field studies and our own measurements. The results show large differences between the different technologies: while electric heat pumps performed quite well in most categories, wood pellet systems performed the best with respect to climate change. The latter, however, are associated with high impacts in other environmental impact categories and on a local scale. The promotion of some technologies (especially systems based on fuel oil, a mixture of fuel oil and rapeseed oil, or a mixture of natural gas and biomethane) by the newly introduced German legislation is doubtful. In terms of the immissions of wood pellet systems, it can be concluded that, even for extremely unfavorable meteorological conditions, the regulatory limits are not exceeded and the heating systems have a negligible influence on the total PM load in the ambient air.

Suggested Citation

  • Johannes Henkel & Robert Kunde & Matthias Gaderer & Georg Erdmann, 2009. "Assessment of Global Emissions, Local Emissions and Immissions of Different Heating Systems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 1(3), pages 1-22, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:1:y:2009:i:3:p:494-515:d:5568
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/1/3/494/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/1/3/494/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chihiro Kayo & Ryu Noda, 2018. "Climate Change Mitigation Potential of Wood Use in Civil Engineering in Japan Based on Life-Cycle Assessment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-19, February.
    2. Jing Lin & Boqiang Lin, 2016. "How Much CO 2 Emissions Can Be Reduced in China’s Heating Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(7), pages 1-16, July.
    3. Karner, K. & Dißauer, C. & Enigl, M. & Strasser, C. & Schmid, E., 2017. "Environmental trade-offs between residential oil-fired and wood pellet heating systems: Forecast scenarios for Austria until 2030," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 868-879.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:1:y:2009:i:3:p:494-515:d:5568. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.