Decarbonizing China’s Residential Heating Sector: Harvesting Waste Heat

Decarbonizing China’s Residential Heating Sector: Harvesting Waste Heat | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Research Article Decarbonizing China’s Residential Heating Sector: Harvesting Waste Heat Jing Huang, Yanran Yang, Dalia Patino-Echeverri This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-8434379/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Heating remains a global sustainability challenge due to its high energy and carbon intensity. While northern Chinese cities benefit from fossil-fuel-based district heating infrastructure, southern cities largely depend on inefficient household heating. We present a nationwide, high-resolution analysis of the feasibility, costs, and benefits of integrating waste heat from 4,360 industrial and energy plants into district heating across 339 cities. Combining plant-level spatiotemporal matching with lifecycle cost–benefit analysis under varying carbon prices and climate scenarios, results show that waste heat can meet up to 92% of urban heating demand at levelized costs of 11–29 CNY GJ⁻¹ in existing district heating (DH) provinces and 11–36 CNY GJ⁻¹ elsewhere. Prioritizing waste heat from nuclear power plants costs less and avoids 325–361 Mt CO₂e annually. Our results identify waste heat as a scalable and sustainable residential heating solution in China and propose equitable and low-carbon heating transition pathways globally. Residential Heating Waste Heat District Heating Lifecycle Cost-Benefit Analysis Full Text Additional Declarations The authors declare no competing interests. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-8434379","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":564726843,"identity":"cb59ba7d-919a-4e15-af1c-1810151e597d","order_by":0,"name":"Jing Huang","email":"","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7309-8075","institution":"","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Jing","middleName":"","lastName":"Huang","suffix":""},{"id":564726585,"identity":"79770d97-67f5-454f-9b34-4c653d9e642c","order_by":1,"name":"Yanran Yang","email":"data:image/png;base64,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","orcid":"","institution":"Duke Kunshan University","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Yanran","middleName":"","lastName":"Yang","suffix":""},{"id":564726586,"identity":"490a6892-6965-4921-a91f-d478be0bcc3c","order_by":2,"name":"Dalia Patino-Echeverri","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"Duke University","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Dalia","middleName":"","lastName":"Patino-Echeverri","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-12-23 13:46:09","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":{"humanSubjects":false,"vertebrateSubjects":false,"conflictsOfInterestStatement":false,"humanSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false,"humanSubjectConsent":false,"humanSubjectClinicalTrial":false,"humanSubjectCaseReport":false,"vertebrateSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false},"doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8434379/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8434379/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":99320521,"identity":"eedaf566-6b78-49f6-94a7-f894275fbbf6","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-12-31 16:38:42","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":2241581,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Manuscriptmaintext.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8434379/v1_covered_23c0d511-d841-41a5-b0c4-1f7e63723837.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"The authors declare no competing interests.","formattedTitle":"\u003cp\u003eDecarbonizing China’s Residential Heating Sector: Harvesting Waste Heat\u003c/p\u003e","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"Duke Kunshan University","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":true,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"Residential Heating, Waste Heat, District Heating, Lifecycle Cost-Benefit Analysis","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8434379/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8434379/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003eHeating remains a global sustainability challenge due to its high energy and carbon intensity. While northern Chinese cities benefit from fossil-fuel-based district heating infrastructure, southern cities largely depend on inefficient household heating. We present a nationwide, high-resolution analysis of the feasibility, costs, and benefits of integrating waste heat from 4,360 industrial and energy plants into district heating across 339 cities. Combining plant-level spatiotemporal matching with lifecycle cost–benefit analysis under varying carbon prices and climate scenarios, results show that waste heat can meet up to 92% of urban heating demand at levelized costs of 11–29 CNY GJ⁻¹ in existing district heating (DH) provinces and 11–36 CNY GJ⁻¹ elsewhere. Prioritizing waste heat from nuclear power plants costs less and avoids 325–361 Mt CO₂e annually. 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