District Heating and Cooling Planning for Lachine Eco District
Goal
To carry out technical simulations on building energy and district heating networks and determine the economic feasibility of different solutions. In addition, the project aims to assist the municipality in addressing the governance challenges inherent in developing district heating for a brownfield redevelopment. There are currently no established local precedents for district energy systems at this scale in Québec, so it will be important to consult multiple stakeholders with differing interests and capacities to finance or structure the project and investigate questions around ownership, procurement, and connection policy that the municipality must resolve for the project to move from concept toward implementation.
Description
In the project the forecasted energy demand of the planned eco district in Lachine is modeled and various district energy solutions are analyzed, following the staged development of the site over the next decades.
The project considers district heating and cooling network design (e.g. high-temperature heat pumps, thermal storage, and residual/waste heat sources such as the Lachine Canal, sewer heat, and geothermal), how the network might evolve and expand in phases as the district is built out, and the choice between 4th-generation (60–80°C) and 5th-generation (low-temperature, ambient-source) network concepts. It also examines the governance and business-model landscape for delivering district energy in a brownfield context: ownership and risk-allocation models ranging from fully public to fully private, procurement approaches, and precedents from comparable Canadian projects and international best practice. It has been informed by a stakeholder consultation to understand key interests, influences, and concerns.
Our team
- Prof. Ursula Eicker, Canada Excellence Research Chair Laureate in Smart, Sustainable and Resilient Communities and Cities, and Founding Director of NGCI, Scientific director
- Oriol Gavaldà, Manager, Research and Innovation Programs, NGCI, Project coordinator
Research collaborators:
- Abolfazl Reza, PhD student, NGCI
- Andrea Gabaldon, PhD student, NGCI
