The project, coordinated by RINA, focuses on the recovery of excess heat from data centres and its integration with seasonal storage.
The name of the project THUNDER stands for ‘THermochemical storage Utilization eNabling Data centre seasonal Energy Recovery’. The project’s kick-off meeting took place on 30-31 January 2024 in Genoa and will last 4 years (until January 2028).
The project aims to overcome existing barriers to heat recovery from data centres by providing an innovative, efficient and cost attractive seasonal thermal storage system based on thermochemical materials coupled with a high temperature heat pump to supply an existing district heating network in Varna (Bulgaria).
THUNDER solutions stretch across the value chain (data centre innovative storage providers, heat pump manufacturers and district energy company operators). The THUNDER solutions will be validated in field conditions at the Demosite in Bulgaria where the practice of waste heat recovery from data centres is not widely diffused, thus boosting the market also in those areas.
Deepened replicability assessment will be done and prefeasibility analysis developed in 10 further Demosites across all over Europe. Co-design and training workshops will be organized at the replicability identified sites to promote stakeholders engagement and social awareness thus unlocking barriers and make it real THUNDER replication.
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