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Energy and C02 savings of a special kind

2023-01-24 | 

The Weichenwerk Wörth GmbH (WWG) site is the first site within the voestalpine Railways Systems Group whose heated buildings have been completely thermally renovated.

In buildings, a large part of the energy is unnecessarily lost as heat loss via the outer wall, windows, top floor and basement ceiling. Minimising these losses not only reduces heating and cooling costs, but also protects the climate. WWG started thinking about improving the energy balance early on, and began implementing the measures in 2012:

Over the last 10 years, 12 buildings with a total heated area of about 12,000 m² or 78,000 m³ of heated building volume have been renovated,

says Manfred Torschitz, Vice President - HSEE of vaRS GmbH, and he also gives some striking examples that show how extensive the measures were:

The renovation of all façades including windows, gates, wall surfaces and also the roofs, i.e. roof surfaces and skylights, were taken into account. All this covered an enveloping surface of about 19,000 m² and corresponds to an area of almost three Bundesliga football pitches.

The result is truly impressive:

At Weichenwerk Wörth GmbH, there is now a saving of 65% of the energy required for heating or the natural gas needed for it.

By comparison, this corresponds to a saving of 2,800 MWh of heating energy per year. If boiler and distribution losses are included, this means that about 333,000 m³ of natural gas are avoided per year. Manfred Torschitz: 

This could supply about 230 average households all year round!

12 % green electricity

In addition, in cooperation with WWG's joint venture partner ÖBB (Austrian Federal Railways), the first PV system was installed on the company building 1 (PV area approx. 1,000 m² - output 200 KWpeak). "This means that WWG can already supply itself with about 12 percent green electricity from its own roof."