Industry is the largest energy consumer in Germany, but private households are right behind. They use the majority of their energy to heat apartments and houses. Despite improved insulation in recent decades, energy demand continues to rise as living space increases.
Highly granular data can support efficient heat demand planning.
With its dashboard, Nexiga supports users from the very beginning all the way to building-specific thermal data for the energy sector. Even with the Hellbrise Monitor for analyzing electricity market dynamics, the presentation and visualization of relevant energy data proved to be a key component.
The data on the interactive map is sourced from the Nexiga database and our partner DBI – Gas Technology Institute gGmbH, a subsidiary of the DBI Group (more information).
Various factors are taken into account when determining heating demand, including specific building data such as the number of floors, building type, year of construction, and renovation status, as well as information from 3D building data (LOD2). Sociodemographic characteristics such as household size and regional climate data are also incorporated into the calculations.
Heating demand in Germany
Key metrics for the heating market
The "Heat Demand in Germany" dashboard makes selected, highly granular heat data publicly available for the first time. The new platform enables a comprehensive, data-driven analysis of heating and hot water demand at Postal code and municipal levels across Germany. In doing so, Nexiga is establishing a crucial foundation for strategic heat demand planning by energy suppliers and local governments.
The data is aggregated at Municipality and ZIP code levels for intuitive use, but is consistently based on building-level modeling.
This opens up new opportunities for professional users in heat demand planning and sales.
In the energy sector, and particularly in municipal heating planning, knowledge of heating requirements is crucial. The municipal heat planning aims to put the heat supply of cities and municipalities on a sustainable and climate-friendly footing. The focus is on switching to renewable energies and unavoidable waste heat in order to reduce dependence on fossil fuels and achieve climate targets.
The freely accessible dashboard provides key metrics for data-driven decision-making in the heating market. These include:
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Heating demand per square meter (kWh/m²a)
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Total heat demand by region
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Heat demand per capita
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Number of heated buildings and floor areas
At the ZIP code level, it provides a concise overview of heating and hot water demand and visualizes key indicators such as population, energy demand, and heated floor area in interactive maps and charts. It also displays building structures by age group, energy source, and type of use.
Building-specific data for heat demand planning
The dashboard provides an introduction to data-driven heat demand planning, demonstrates the quality and depth of the data, and serves as a foundation for initial regional analyses and market assessments. For more in-depth inquiries, Nexiga offers the complete datasets and analyses—down to the building level—on a commercial basis.
The calculation of heat demand is carried out in close collaboration with the German Fuel Institute (DBI). This is based on the DIN EN ISO 52016-1 standard for the energy performance assessment of buildings. This ensures high quality, comparability, and transparency of the results. Learn more.
By analyzing the data, cities and municipalities in particular can identify more quickly where investments in heating networks are worthwhile or where buildings should be renovated to be particularly energy-efficient.
Possible areas of application are
Local governments and energy providers benefit
Local governments, energy providers/municipal utilities, and real estate companies, in particular, benefit from this highly granular data set, which enables them to implement legally required heat planning in a targeted manner.
The combination of an open dashboard and scalable data depth makes it possible, on the one hand, to identify regions with high decarbonization potential and, on the other hand, to plan heating networks and infrastructure projects more precisely. Last but not least, investments and funding can bemanagedin a targeted manner.
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Municipal Heat Planning: Identifying Areas with High Heat Demand for Targeted Planning of Networks and Measures
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Sales and Market Development: Prioritizing regions and target groups for energy products (e.g., district heating, heat pumps)
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Site and Network Expansion Planning: Assessing Opportunities for Infrastructure Investments Such as District Heating Networks or Charging Infrastructure
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Portfolio and Renovation Analysis: Assessment of the energy-saving potential of building inventories to identify modernization measures
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Analysis of Heating Needs: Where Investments in the District Heating Network Are Worthwhile.
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Optimization of supply networks: Analysis of heat demand to identify capacity bottlenecks and reduce energy losses.
