Page 153 - Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

130 Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

DEFINITION OF RENEWABLE ENERGY
Renewable energy is here defined as energy arising from natural resources
such as sunlight, wind, rain, waves, tides, and geothermal heat, which are
naturally replenished within a span of a few years. Renewable energy includes
the technologies that convert natural resources into useful energy services,
such as

l Wind, wave, tidal, and hydropower (including micro and river-off hydro)
l Solar power (including photovoltaic), solar thermal, and geothermal power
l Biomass and biofuel technologies (including biogas)
l Renewable fraction of waste (household and industrial waste)
Household and industrial waste are composed of different types of waste.
Some fractions are regarded as renewable energy sources, such as potato peel,
whereas others are nonrenewable sources, such as plastic products. Only the
fraction of waste that is naturally replenished is usually included in the defi-
nition. However, in the Energy Town Frederikshavn project, for practical
reasons, the entire waste fraction is included as forming part of the renewable
energy sources.
When calculating the share of renewable energy sources (RES) in the
system, the import and export of power is converted to fuel equivalence, i.e.,
the fuel needed to produce the power on a power plant with an efficiency of
40%. The same factor has been used when wind power is compared to fuel.
Moreover, when calculating the share of RES, the share of wind power has
been corrected into the expected production of a normal wind year. In
Denmark, wind years vary within the range 20%.

Definition of Project Area
The project includes the town of Frederikshavndthe three suburbs of
Strandby, Elling, and Kilden as well as a limited number of isolated houses.
The population of the entire area is approximately 25,000. The delimitation of
the project area is in large part established to correspond to the boundary of the
local electricity distribution company Frederikshavn Elnet A/S.
The town of Frederikshavn should not be confused with the Municipality
of Frederikshavn, which encompasses a larger area extending to the northern
tip of Denmark.
The entire area is indicated on the map to the left, where the blue line
shows the delimitation. Areas hatched in red are district heating areas. Areas
hatched in green are supplied with natural gas. Evidently, even within the
contiguously built-up area of central Frederikshavn, there are potentials for
expansion of district heating, as some areas are currently supplied by natural
gas for heating purposes.