Horizon Europe/CINEA project SUSHEAT (Sustainable Heat) officially launched its four-year project in May, 2023 to validate a thermal heat energy upgrade solution for industry using Artificial Intelligence (AI). The final results will be ready in April, 2027.
SUSHEAT will use solar, waste and ambient heat working with High-Temperature Heat Pumps (HT-HP) and thermal energy storage tanks to provide large amounts of flexible, on demand heat and steam supply for factory processes. The thermal heat upgrade system will be complete at a Technical Readiness Level of 5, which is validation in a laboratory setting.
The SUSHEAT Consortium of 14 partners met for the first time in Madrid, Spain from 13 to 14 June, 2023.
SUSHEAT draws together a highly proficient, diverse set of skills and expertise in energy, AI, equipment manufacturing and academic institutions.
The project comprises multiple-sector engineers with specific expertise in the project’s key outputs, as well as partners with business, communication and modelling experience.
Key to the data input and validation of the SUSHEAT system are the two global industrial partners that come from the fish and dairy sectors.
The Consortium has an unusually high number of SMEs that are eager to bring results to market post-project, strengthening the business case for the results.
The Thermal Systems and Renewable Energy (STER) group at UNED hosted the successful SUSHEAT kick-off meeting on campus.
The project is being led and co-ordinated by the Thermal Systems and Renewable Energy (STER) group from the Energy Engineering Department at the Industrial Engineering School at Europe’s largest public university, UNED (Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia) in Madrid, Spain.
RTDS Group, Vienna is leading the Communication, Dissemination and Exploitation of the project (DEC). Social channel support will be provided by project partner ANALISIS-DSC, Spain.
The most memorable moment was when the SUSHEAT Control and Digital Integration system lead Alex Butean from WIZ Research gave a presentation on the incredible capabilities of AI being able to generate massive amounts of information within minutes.
Butean demonstrated AI tools, including ChatGPT, to explain how intelligent solutions process data and information at speeds humans cannot match.
Project start — May 2023.
Hardware software connection and data reliability tests — December 2024.
Production manual for High Temperature Heat Pumps (HT-HP) — April 2024.
Final design of TES tanks — April 2024
Heat pump ready for installation in test system — September 2025.
Control and Decision Support System — October 2025.
SUSHEAT laboratory rig-commissioning — November 2025.
Project end and final results — April 2027.