cogeneration

A nice thing with cogeneration is that it works best when photovoltaic panels work the least.

The only time these designs seem to work is when there's never any water (islands) or they have a complex cogeneration strategy.

Town heating / district heating is based on cogeneration (combined heat and power, CHP).

Admittedly, the biggest news is that they might produce a cogeneration heater for <$10K.

For Sweden, the coal plants were exclusively for cogeneration (district heating with electricity as a byproduct) and only used as peaker plants in winter.

Most also do cogeneration as well (energy + heat/steam distribution).

Cogeneration plant goes up right next to datacentre, and then various municipal services are built near that - including other factories, high density commercial and high density residential that can take advantage of cogeneration and use district heat.

In some areas, natural-gas fired cogeneration only is really necessary in the winter during dark months/cold weather - which is an ideal situation to be producing district heat.

The unstressed win here is the cogeneration.

Looking for a self sustaining cogeneration unit that can produce heat and power if needed, if anyone has recommendations, for when I need to recommend it.

It might function as a kind of cogeneration-style buffer, but CO₂ still gets emitted in manufacturing and maintenance — and I’m not sure the volumetric efficiency is all that compelling.

Solar on rooftops in low density commercial is awesome, and smaller generation (especially cogeneration) makes sense in some areas, but big efficient generating stations still make a lot of sense for super high density areas like Lower Manhattan.

This is why most cogeneration or waste heat schemes are on industrial processes - their "waste" heat is pumping out at above boiling at a minimum, and far more useful.

Cogeneration is a great way to increase the efficiency of these systems.