District heating in Trentino by ATZWANGER

We at ATZWANGER are among the pioneers in the field of district heating. From the very beginning, our focus has been on maintaining high quality standards to ensure that heat is delivered where it is needed, with no waste.

Back in 2002, we designed and constructed an 8 MW biomass heating plant in San Martino di Castrozza, complete with the corresponding heat distribution network.

In 2010, a similar, larger biomass plant with a total capacity of 25 MW was built in Fiera di Primiero.

The district heating network has been continuously expanded and enlarged in both locations, which have since merged to form a single municipality. At ATZWANGER, we are, of course, proud to have been entrusted once again with expanding the network and installing the transfer stations in 2023 and 2025.

The numbers speak for themselves: almost 70 km of pre-insulated steel district heating pipes have now been laid, and over 1,560 heat transfer stations have been installed. There are approximately 50 kilometres of district heating pipes and over 1,250 heat transfer stations in Fiera di Primiero, and around 18 kilometres of pipes and over 310 heat transfer stations in San Martino di Castrozza. Of course, the number of heat transfer stations does not correspond to the number of consumers, since apartment buildings are also supplied with district heating.

Mauro Ferrari, the responsible project manager at ATZWANGER, has been overseeing the plants since the biomass power stations were built. “They're almost like two children to me,” he says, smiling. “It's a pleasure to see that the systems are working reliably and that the customer is satisfied.”