Rachel Cunningham
Ireland’s first publicly-owned not-for-profit energy company, Trading as Heatworks, is now providing low-carbon heat to public buildings in South Dublin.
Minister for the Environment, Climate & Communications and Transport, Eamon Ryan, and the Mayor of South Dublin County, Councillor Emma Murphy, officially opened South Dublin County Council’s Tallaght District Heating Network at the Heatworks Energy Centre in Tallaght.
The network uses excess heat from Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) data centre to provide low carbon heat to the network customers.
AWS has included heat-collection systems in its new facility and provides this recycled heat at no cost as part of its broader sustainability commitments.
It is estimated that in this first phase of delivery, the carbon emissions reduction in the Tallaght area will be over 1,500 tonnes per year.
Heatworks contracted Fortum, a large Finnish energy company with extensive district-heating experience throughout Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, to carry out the design, construction, operation and maintenance of the Tallaght District Heating Network.
The network will initially provide heat to 32,800m2 of public buildings, including County Hall, Tallaght County Library, the SDCC Innovation Centre and 133 affordable apartments, which will be connected in early 2025.
The university buildings include the main building, the sports science, health and recreation building. The new Catering College will also avail of this service upon its completion in 2024.
Speaking at the Official Opening, Minister Ryan described the initiative as a “leading example of how energy that would be otherwise be wasted is now being used.”
“It’s also a working demonstration of smart private-public partnership and an indication of the transformative role that district heating can play in our new more energy efficient and decarbonised energy mix,” he commented.
“In our Climate Action Plan 2023, we have set out our increased ambition for district heating.
“I anticipate that our district heating steering group will shortly publish its recommendations on how we can reach these targets, led by our local authorities and facilitated with private sector involvement as is the case here in Tallaght,” the minister added.
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