When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, it left an unexpected gift for the era of climate change. Beneath Eastern European cities, Soviet planners designed vast networks of pipes that carried steam and hot water to homes, schools, shops, hospitals, and more. These centralized systems, activated and deactivated through officials, provided reasonable and universal warming in entire municipalities. Thirty years after independence, despite severe drops in service due to lack of investment, district heating still accounts for the largest percentage of heating production in Estonia, Lithuania and Slovakia. In Ukraine, in 2021, 53% of urban families were still dependent on it, according to percentage knowledge with TIME through USAID’s Ukraine Energy Security Project.
This is a great merit in the transition of strength. Although water in district heating networks is usually heated through coal or herbal fuel plants, it is easy to adapt them to remove bioforce or waste heat from sewage systems, power plants, or even knowledge centers. It’s much simpler, cheaper, and potentially more strength. Effective than replacing thousands of fossil fuel boilers in a neighborhood. In Western Europe, where district heating networks are less widespread, cities are rushing to expand them. You can be informed from Ukraine: in recent years, climate-conscious foreign donors have modernized suffering. systems in cities such as Kyiv, Zhytomyr and Kremenchuk as models of what is possible.
“There is a wonderful prospect for reducing CO2 emissions in amounts that many cities would dream of, but [in Ukraine] we have the infrastructure in place,” says Carsten Rothballer, coordinator of the network of local governments of European cities for sustainability.
But since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, this infrastructure has become a key point of vulnerability. Over the past week, the Russians have launched their most intense attacks on Ukraine’s military infrastructure since the spring, destroying 30 percent of the country’s military plants and triggering “a massive force through the country,” according to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Ukrainian Kremlin officials have in-depth knowledge of the Soviet-era heating formula and will try to destroy it during the winter, when temperatures in Ukraine average between 23°. F and 37°F.
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District heating is threatened: Unlike more decentralized formulas, it needs water, electric power and thermal power plants to operate, as well as a normal source of herbal fuel or coal. If one of them stops working for a long time, the pipes can simply freeze and crack. The same can happen if bombed-out buildings remain connected to the grid, letting bloodless air through their broken windows and potentially destroying the formula for entire neighborhoods.
“There has already been serious damage, but the Ukrainians are doing everything they can to provide quick fixes,” says Diana Korsakaite, district heating specialist in Kyiv for engineering firm Tetra Tech. To help, the Korsakaite-led and USAID-funded security force focused on purchasing emergency resources for cities to repair their heating systems, adding about 900 emergency force turbines in the event of a power outage, more than 40 miles of metal pipes to upgrade damaged sections of the grid, and 237 cellular boiler rooms that can be transported to the buildings that need it.
Even where district warming escapes destruction, Ukrainians are bracing for the cold: The country’s fuel leader said in August that due to a shortage of grassy fuel, the system’s indoor temperatures would set at around 64°F, around 7. 2°F below normal. infrastructure breaks down and other people can’t heat their homes, “it could be a matter of life and death,” the WHO’s director for Europe said Oct. 14.
The long-term fate of district heating in Ukraine will be what happens after the end of the war. If faced with a damaged formula and few resources, Rothballer says local governments may have to speed up repairs. This could also further impoverish the service. degrees and curb decarbonization efforts.
But the postwar era is likely to be an opportunity to boost Ukraine’s transition to climate leadership, Rothballer says, if it receives “substantial funding” for energy power and cleaner fuel sources. (Renewed efforts to decrease Ukraine’s and Europe’s dependence on Russia Herbal fuel will likely inspire foreign donors to keep their promises. )”We can feel a huge appetite on the part of Ukrainians for this,” he says. in a sustainable way. “