Investment in energy-efficient housing

ThumbsUp - Thermal energy storage solUtions to optimally Manage BuildingS and Unlock their grid balancing and flexibility Potential – is one of four Horizon Europe CINEA funded research and demonstration projects seeking to develop energy storage solutions to make our grid and heat systems smarter.

What does this mean?

ThumbsUp aims to develop and demonstrate thermal energy storage (TES) at daily and weekly level solutions to be easily integrated in EU buildings to increase their energy efficiency as well as to exploit Power-to-Heat (PtH) approaches to make EU buildings grid flexibility actors.

What is the Thermal Energy Storage challenge?

Each day there are peaks and low points in the heat needed in our homes. At peak heat demand periods electrical energy can have its highest costs and both electricity and heat can have their highest environmental impacts. Thermal energy storage can allow heat to be stored at times of low cost and environmental impact to then be released from storage for use at these high peak periods.

What technologies will be used?

ThumbsUp wil utilise two different thermal storage technologies to address the peaks over different storage periods.

• Daily level - (based on environmental friendly Phase Change Materials [PCM])
• Weekly level - (based on Thermochemical Material sorption technology)

Both these technologies allow the storage of heat at a higher density compared to just tanks of hot water.

ThumbsUp and the three other projects funded by the Horizon programme want to overcome all the challenges of integrating thermal energy storage technologies into buildings, while increasing TES energy density and reducing the cost for these important energy storage technologies.

Let's talk about Thermal Storage

To support this aim all four projects will be engaging stakeholders from across Europe to share knowledge and experiences, technology development details and information and results from the demonstrstion projects.

The first stage of this process of engagement and communications will happen 6th Spetember in Savona, Italy at the SUPEHR23 conference hosted by the University of Genoa and its partners. The TES project partners will hold an online and in person event showcasing the thermal energy storage solutions from each project and then building some consensus on the key challenges and opportunities for collaboration ahead.

Please sign in on the website https://www.thumbsupstorage.eu/evenemang/thermal-energy-storage-joint-workshop to join us online or register at the SUPHR 23 event https://supehr23.unige.it/ to be there in person.

For more information on the ThumnbsUp project, the technologies, the demonstrators and the goals for sector coupling and controls and modelling please look at our website here - THUMBS UP (thumbsupstorage.eu)

The THUMBS UP project received funding from the European Union's Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No. 101096921.

Citation: 1 Andersen, P & Georg, Susse & Gram-Hanssen, Kirsten & Heiselberg, Per & Horsbøl, Anders & Johansen, Katinka & Johra, Hicham & Marszal, Anna & Møller, E. (2019). Using residential buildings to manage flexibility in the district heating network: perspectives and future visions from sector professionals. IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science. 352. 012032. 10.1088/1755-1315/352/1/012032.

FACTS
Funding: European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No. 101096921 
Duration: 1/01/23 → 31/12/26
Budget: Euro 7.6 million (with funding of approximately Euro 6.4 million) 
Coordinator: Veolia Servicios Lecam Sociedad Anonima Unipersonal (ES) 
Partners: algoWatt; CARTIF; Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche; Centre for Research & Technology Hellas (CERTH); Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI); Gradyent; Grid Singularity; i-TES; Johanneberg Science Park; Kelvin; NanoPhos; Politecnico di Torino; Pluss Advanced Technologies B.V.; Sorption Technologies; Ubitech Energy and the universities of Birmingham, Genova, Lleida and Messina

https://www.thumbsupstorage.eu/