What is needed to phase out residential oil heating in Finnish single-family houses?

Hast, Aira; Ekholm, Tommi; Syri, Sanna

doi:10.1016/j.scs.2016.01.002

Cited by 9 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Changing an oil-based heating system to an alternative, according to Hast et al, is not cost-effective for the owners until the heating system reaches the end of its life cycle or the price of oil rises sufficiently [10]. Madlener and Koller also discovered that discouraged investments and premature retirement of existing heating systems would result in displacement effects ranging from 20% to 40% of positive value-added effect [39].…”

Section: Barriers For Investmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…According to the research from 2016, in Finland, there are still about 200,000 oil heating systems which consume about 460 million liters of oil annually. With a 2.64 kg CO 2eq /l emission factor, the total annual carbon emissions are about 1.21 million metric tonnes of CO 2eq from residential heating due to burning fossil fuels [10], and these heating systems need to be eliminated to achieve the carbon neutrality.…”

Section: Introduction 1backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Investment and Profitability of Community Heating Systems Using Bioenergy in Finland: Opportunities and Challenges

Föhr

Gyawali

et al. 2021

Sustainability

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Oil heating systems are abundant in rural Finland and they need to be replaced by renewable energy as Finland aims to be carbon neutral by 2035. Bioenergy, one of the renewable energies, is a common source of energy in Finland as the country is rich in forest resources. In Finland, combined heat and power plants utilize such resource to produce district heat and electricity but Finnish rural areas do not have access to the district heating network. However, there are potential scenarios where community heating could be possible using portable chip-fired heating systems (heat containers). Ultimately, the cost of heating is an important factor for the consumers and the cost of investment is likely to put off any interest from the communities. In this research, we explored the cost and profitability of heat container investments in rural Finland and examined the challenges for the energy transition away from oil heating systems, as well as the opportunities decentralized biomass-fired heating systems might bring. The results of this research indicate that the price of heat produced in heat containers is comparatively higher than district heating, which is commonly used in cities in Finland, but is cost-competitive compared to oil heating depending on the price of oil. For example, the current price of LFO (~1 EUR/l) generates costlier heat than the 300 kW heat container provides. Firing wood pellets in the heat container is not economically viable due to expensive raw material but smaller-sized heat container (110 kW) firing wood chips could provide cost-competitive heat if uptime is raised to >2700 h/year. There are socio-economic impacts and value-added effects on the rural region due to utilization of local resource instead of imported LFO but there remain challenges and barriers such as high initial investment, low investment support and lack of policies focused on decentralised energy enterprises.

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Section: Barriers For Investmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introduction 1backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Investment and Profitability of Community Heating Systems Using Bioenergy in Finland: Opportunities and Challenges

Föhr

Gyawali

et al. 2021

Sustainability

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“…The phase-out of residential oil heating has been addressed in a few studies so far. Hast et al [11] found that replacing oil heating in Finland is economically convenient at the end of the operational lifetime of the boiler, while an early replacement strongly depends on the oil price. Most studies agree that the operational costs are the main driver for the choice of alternative heating techniques [11,12], although residential users are more likely to consider other factors such as comfort and reliability [13].…”

Section: Classification Category Valuementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Hast et al [11] found that replacing oil heating in Finland is economically convenient at the end of the operational lifetime of the boiler, while an early replacement strongly depends on the oil price. Most studies agree that the operational costs are the main driver for the choice of alternative heating techniques [11,12], although residential users are more likely to consider other factors such as comfort and reliability [13]. As for environmental impacts of oil heating, Kheirbek et al [14] state that phasing it out in New York State and City would avoid 290 premature deaths per year thanks to the reduction of PM 2.5 concentrations.…”

Section: Classification Category Valuementioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental and Economic Benefits from the Phase-out of Residential Oil Heating: A Study from the Aosta Valley Region (Italy)

et al. 2019

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Although its use is declining, oil heating is still used in areas not covered by the methane grid. Oil heating is becoming more and more expensive, requires frequent tank refill operations, and has high emissions of greenhouse gas (GHG) and air pollutants such as SOx. In addition, spills from oil underground storage tanks (USTs) represent a serious environmental threat to soil and groundwater quality. In this paper, we present a comprehensive analysis on technical alternatives to oil heating with reference to the Aosta Valley (NW Italy), where this fuel is still often used and numerous UST spills have been reported in the last 20 years. We assess operational issues, GHG and pollutant emissions, and unit costs of the heat produced for several techniques: LPG boilers, wood boilers (logs, chips, pellets) and heat pumps (air-source, geothermal closed-loop and open-loop systems). We examine the investment to implement such solutions in two typical cases, a detached house and a block of flats, deriving payback times of about 3–8 years. Wood log boilers turn out to be the most economically convenient solutions; however, heat pumps provide several benefits from the operational and environmental points of view. In addition, including solar thermal panels for domestic hot water or a photovoltaic plant would have payback times of about 6–9 years. The results highlight the economic feasibility and the multiple benefits of a rapid phase-out of oil heating in Italy.

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“…These are system with a heat pump (HP), as well as system with a wood pellet firing boiler (biomass boiler). Both are RES-based and seem the most ecological and energy-efficient [9,10]. The main purpose of the work is to answer the following question: which of the two selected heat sources is more economically beneficial for small detached house?…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparative analysis of heat pump and biomass boiler for small detached house heating

2017

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Abstract. The purpose of the work is to answer the question -which of the two selected heat sources is more economically beneficial for small detached house: heat pump or biomass boiler fuelled with woodpellets? The comparative analysis of these sources was carried out to discuss the issue. First, cost of both, equipment and operation of selected heat systems were analysed. Additionally, CO 2 emission levels associated with these heat systems were determined. The comparative analysis of the costs of both considered heat systems showed that equipment cost of heat pump system is considerably bigger than the cost of biomass boiler system. The comparison of annual operation costs showed that heat pump operation cost is slightly lower than operation cost of biomass boiler. The analysis of above results shows that lower operation cost of heat pump in comparison with biomass boiler cost lets qualify heat pump as more economically justified only after 38 years of work. For both analysed devices, CO 2 emission levels were determined. The considerations take into account the fact that heat pump consumes electricity. It is mostly generated through combustion of coal in Poland. The results show that in Poland biomass boiler can be described as not only more economically justified system but also as considerably more ecological.

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What is needed to phase out residential oil heating in Finnish single-family houses?

Cited by 9 publications

References 28 publications

Investment and Profitability of Community Heating Systems Using Bioenergy in Finland: Opportunities and Challenges

Investment and Profitability of Community Heating Systems Using Bioenergy in Finland: Opportunities and Challenges

Environmental and Economic Benefits from the Phase-out of Residential Oil Heating: A Study from the Aosta Valley Region (Italy)

Comparative analysis of heat pump and biomass boiler for small detached house heating

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