AEE Intec

June 3, 2019
Solar heat for desalination and metal recovery

Small desalination systems could help fight water scarcity, recover precious metals from industrial water, and treat wastewater from food processing so it can be re-used for field irrigation. These are but a few areas under study in Task 62, Solar Energy in Industrial Water &...
May 22, 2019
First SDH system in Sub-Saharan Africa

On 15 May, the Austrian Ambassador to South Africa inaugurated two landmark projects that had received support from SOLTRAIN, the Southern African Solar Thermal Training and Demonstration Initiative, during planning and installation. One became the first solar district heating plant in Sub-...
November 20, 2018
Solar hot water system at Jordanian hospital pays off in 4.4 years

In June, Al Bashir Hospital, the largest public hospital in Jordan, started up a 1,133 m² (0.8 MWt_h) solar field which it said would provide 10 % of the heat required per year. Large 12.5 m² collectors had been installed by Millennium Energy Industries (MEI), a local supplier of...
November 19, 2018
Renewable energy cooperatives for SDH

Citizens’ interest in funding photovoltaic systems and wind farms is huge and opportunities to do so have often been seized within a few days. The current aim of the Austria Solar association is to repeat the success of those projects in another market: In September, it published a guide on...
November 6, 2018
ISEC 2018: Working across technological boundaries

The first International Sustainable Energy Conference, or ISEC for short, was held in October, and it was a roaring success. The three-day gathering of renewable experts in Graz, Austria, was attended by 370 people from 51 countries. Organiser AEE INTEC had put together a programme...
October 29, 2018
European Solar Thermal Technology Panel elects new chairman

The members of the European Solar Thermal Technology Panel (ESTTP) elected a new chairman at their most recent steering committee meeting, held in mid-September at the same time as the Eurosun 2018 conference. His name: Marco Calderoni, Senior Project Manager at the Italian innovation...
August 14, 2018
Concrete slabs store thermal energy and heat homes

Many building owners consider roof-integrated solar systems to be a tried-and-true way of saving as much on their heating bills as they can. A research project called solSPONGEhigh and developed in Austria has shown: When using thermal mass, i.e., the capacity of a building to store heat in...
July 18, 2018
Sector coupling still at an early stage

‘Sector coupling’ has become one of the most well-known terms to describe the transformation of energy markets. It had originally been created for models that use surplus renewables, such as wind and solar electricity, to provide heat and power new means of transport. International...
June 6, 2018
Rising demand for solar heat in large buildings and industry

By the end of 2017, the market for solar heating and cooling had grown by 472 GW_th, which again made it the largest for solar energy in the world. The one for photovoltaic systems gained 402 GW_p to become the second-largest, and 5 GW_el was enough for...
May 3, 2018
Record participation at SDH 2018 in Graz

The 5^th International Solar District Heating Conference, which took place in Graz, Austria, in mid-April, brought together 350 experts from 33 countries. It had twice as many attendees as the previous one in Billund, Denmark, in 2016 and attracted representatives from several...
April 5, 2018
IEA SHC Webinar: Cost reduction potential above 30 %

The key takeaway from an IEA SHC Solar Academy webinar held on 14 March 2018: There is still much room for cost cuts along the entire solar thermal value chain. The webinar was organised jointly by the IEA Solar Heating & Cooling Programme’s Task 54 and the International Solar Energy...
March 18, 2018
Solar thermal and biomass – a winning solution for district heating

Biomass may be cheap and carbon-neutral, but a solar upgrade of biomass-fired district heating could further improve efficiency and reduce local emissions. For example, solar heat helps avoid having to start up and shut down wood-chip boilers or operate them at partial load. It can even...