Why state of the art geothermal piles were not activated for 14 years by asset managers - the need of technically higher educated asset management staff- a critical appaisal by Hermann Lebherz and Annelie Stumpp WLS

"At the ERES conference in Milano 2010 we delivered a paper on state of the art geothermal piles for a shopping centre with offices. 14 years later, in the process of a due dilligence report, our company was informed that the geo- thermal heating an cooling plant was in excellent condition and the technical documentation was excellent. But we got asked: „WHY GOT THE GEOTHERMAL PLANT NEVER AT WORK?“A very puzzeling question. The asset managers have rather used electrical engery to cool down or heat a 60 million asset and spent hundred tousands of Euros, rather than starting and monitoring the cooling and heating with the geothermal plant. The system of geothermal modelling is that you have to monitor the ammount of heat you are extracting in the winter period through several 40 m deep concrete piles with intergrated pipes of cirulating liquid. In the summer period one has to monitor the amount of warm energy which is pumped in the piles with tubes which are heating-up the surroundig soil. So a balance has to be calculated between winter heat extraction and a summer cooling extraction over a year period. For this calculations a computer programme monitors all the heating and cooling energy, but it has to be operated by university trained engineers, which have to be trained on the job as well. WLS is assuming that the competion for the job, was awarded to the lowest bid, to an asset management company which employed standard craft men with no knowledge how to handle such a system. A way forward is not to have isolated pants run by individual staff, but to have all plants to be integrated by a internet conection to a monitoring and controlling centre which is staffed with adequately educated and adequately paid university engieering staff, to run and monitor the plants energy efficient. Other clients of WLS introduced now a system by controlling all asset management company duties of their assets on a 2 year cycle."