Kladno and CVUT teams took part in a fact-finding mission to Leipzig between 29. 9. – 30. 9. The meeting was hosted by the Leipzig city team and joined by local partners Cenero and Leipziger Stadtwerke. Main topics were the Leipzig’s municipal strategy to achieve carbon neutrality, implementation of positive energy districts and general transformation of the district heating network away from coal towards less dependence on fossil fuels.

Leipzig’s Nadja Riedel and Kladno’s David Skorna exchanged updates on the state of play of the SPARCS activities in both cities. Johann Singer introduced the city’s climate protection strategy. Simon Baum from Cenero showed the advancement of the Baumwollspinnerei PED.

Leipzig is unique in its approach. It has been preparing the largest solar thermal plant in Germany. Moreover, the city-owned company Leipziger Stadtwerke (LSW, provider of about 30 % of heat supply for Leipzig households) takes extra measures within their decarbonisation strategy. “Stadtwerke is actually showing very progressive thinking as they decided to build a large gas turbine that is hydrogen-ready. The company expects increased production of green hydrogen in Germany in the near future” observed Michal Kuzmic from CVUT team. For the Kladno and CVUT teams it was extremely valuable that they were able to discuss specific aspects of the district heating transformation directly with the LSW staff at the construction site of the Leipzig Süd combined heat and power station. Among other investments LSW has been constructing a high-capacity heat storage.

On the second day CVUT visited University of Leipzig (ULEI) to hold a joint workshop on energy modelling on city and district levels with focus on Leipzig PEDs. Prof Thomas Bruckner and Hendrik Kondziella showed university’s approach and their powerful tool IRPOpt which is used for techno-economic analysis.

The fact-finding mission wasn´t only about observing and exchange but also the mutual replication and joint effort was the aim for the future collaboration – Kladno city can gain from the Leipzig experiences and particular projects (on both sides) might be enriched by mutual experiences not only in field of the district heating.