Patrik Selinder from ZW Energiteknik, a small consultant company in the city of Nyköping (100 km south of Stockholm, Sweden) submitted these maps that were created in Surfer. Their field of operation is mainly in projects connected to District Heating and Solar Energy. You are welcome to visit their website at: http://www.algonet.se/~walle/

They often analyze large amounts of data. A task they regularly encounter is to evaluate the behavior of district heating substations or entire DH networks. A way to simplify the analyses is plotting the data on a 3D surface.

The maps here show how the return pipe temperature of a DH substation varies depending on the ambient (outdoor) temperature and the time of day. The left contour map describes a substation in good working order, the blue areas indicating low return water temperature. The right image portraits a substation with a number of malfunctions (red areas consequently indicates high temperatures).

By correctly reading the contour map, conclusions can be made about the specific malfunctions of the substation, one of the major advantages of the method is that it also shows malfunctions of more “elusive” nature, such as inadequately set controllers. We have recently finished a feasibility study of the method commissioned by the Swedish District Heating Association. The feasibility study will be followed by a more extensive one.

The same approach can be made on other large data sets. They have, for example, successfully used the method for power predictions of heat and power plants.