Vattenfall has connected a University of Bristol campus building to its citywide heat network.
According to a statement, Vattenfall and University of Bristol have delivered a heating and cooling system that can capture and reuse excess heat from the University’s computer servers. This will help to provide heating and hot water for the rest of the campus in the future, it noted, as well as homes and businesses in the local area.
The building will begin exporting heat and will make the heat network more resilient by adding additional low carbon heat sources, the statement added.
The Temple Quarter Enterprise Campus (TQEC) Academic Building will be used for teaching and research across business, innovation, digital engineering, artificial intelligence, quantum and more. The statement said the campus is the catalyst for the Bristol Temple Quarter regeneration project. This is a 135-hectare site that is set to deliver jobs, homes, public and green spaces, it cited.
The University’s Academic Building design uses heat pump technology to enable excess heat to be sent into the Bristol heat network, rather than being wasted.
Dom Barton, director of Bristol Heat Networks at Vattenfall, said: “We’re delighted to be working with the University of Bristol to provide heating, hot water and cooling to the new Temple Quarter Enterprise Campus. This project shows how versatile and innovative heat networks are, recycling excess heat from a range of different sources like computer servers and using it in the University campus as well as in the citywide heat network.”
Stephen Runicles, interim Temple Quarter project director, added: “We are committed to reducing our carbon emissions and the city-wide Bristol heat network offered an opportunity for lower carbon heat energy that is commercially viable long term.
“Our approach in the technical design has been to effectively use, capture and reuse heat energy in the building, and to incorporate the capability to export excess heat to the city-wide network in the future as it matures. It has been a long journey for our first connection, and we look forward to a successful long-term relationship.
“I am delighted with how well the team have coordinated and communicated over the last month. An absolute focus at an impressive pace to meet all the testing and documentation requirements – achieving ‘Adoption’ by Vattenfall on Friday 3 October 2025.
“Thanks to Vattenfall and the Bristol heat network team, Sir Robert McAlpine, NG Bailey, AECOM, Core Group, Buro Happold, Osborne Clarke, Burges Salmon and colleagues at University of Bristol.”