Another district in Szeged connected to Europe's second largest geothermal district heating system

The construction of the geothermal heating system in the Szilléri district of Szeged has been completed, with a budget of HUF 2.352 billion and EU support, the Építési és Közlekedési Minisztérium announced on 15 February. The investor, Geo Hőterm Kft., won a non-reimbursable EU grant of HUF 1.108 billion for the project.

The project involved drilling a productive thermal well at a depth of 2,000 metres on the shore of Lake Zápor at Pentelei Pass. An 8.4 MW capacity plate thermal heat exchanger and a water treatment and chemical dosing system for the recirculation were installed in the water powerhouse. The geothermal loop is served by two slightly shallower injection wells.

The project will generate 2.2 million cubic metres of natural gas per year

The secondary side of the thermal heat exchanger is connected to the Upper Town I heating plant by an insulated pair of transmission lines, which is also connected to two other heating plants via existing transmission lines, so that it can also serve their thermal circuits.

Based on preliminary calculations, the project will annually replace more than 2.2 million cubic metres of natural gas with 69,229 GJ of geothermal energy, and, taking into account the additional electricity consumption, will reduce Szeged's greenhouse gas load by 4,482.44 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year.

In recent years, Szeged has built Europe's second largest geothermal residential district heating system after Reykjavík. The city has 23 thermal districts with district heating systems serving 27 251 homes and 469 institutions. The combustion of the 27 million cubic metres of gas previously used annually resulted in 55,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, making Szegedi Távfheiző Kft., the heating system operator, the biggest polluter of the city's air. Thanks to the series of investments, gas consumption and carbon dioxide emissions from district heating in the city have been halved.