Story by S.J. Grady
USAG Stuttgart Public Affairs Office
Workers prepare insulated pipes before they are installed underground May 23. About 6,000 meters of pipes will be replaced on Panzer Kaserne.
U.S. Army Garrison Stuttgart is moving closer to a greener, more efficient method of providing heat to Panzer Kaserne.
The installation is currently heated by aging oil-fired steam boilers, which have low efficiency limitations and contribute to carbon emissions.
In the future, the caserne will be connected to the Böblingen hot water district heating system.
The system includes the Zweckverband Restmüllheizkraftwerk Böblingen, an incineration plant located about one kilometer from the caserne, where trash from Panzer, along with other customers, is burned for fuel.
Replacing the old system will save the garrison more than €450,000 in fuel costs each year and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 60 percent, according to garrison officials.
Anyone who has recently been to Panzer may have noticed a flurry of construction activity, both inside and outside the gate.
“There are two operations going on. The first is outside the gate. The Germans are connecting their system to our heat substation, and we are replacing our distribution system,” said William Rossignol, the USAG Stuttgart Directorate of Public Works Engineering Division chief.
The garrison is overseeing a $9.4 million project that includes replacing 6,000 meters of underground supply and return lines, and upgrading 34 mechanical rooms with new control units, pumps and heat exchangers.
The German construction firm Leonhard Weiss GmbH and Co. KG is handling the excavation work that began May 6.
So far, the digging has been confined to less traveled areas of the installation. Over the summer through October, however, motorists may find certain streets blocked to through traffic as crews install the grid of insulated pipes, according to Ismail Engin, the DPW project manager.
Once the excavation and pipe installation work is completed next fall, the new system will function in tandem with the old system.
Engin said at that point, crews will focus their attention on upgrading the remaining mechanical rooms and the heat substation in Building 2941.
The entire project is scheduled for completion in spring of 2014, at which time the caserne will be heated entirely by the Böblingen system.
A construction crew digs a trench behind Building 2949 for a new district heating system on Panzer Kaserne May 8. Insulated pipes will be installed underground to carry hot water to and from buildings on Panzer Kaserne. The project is expected to be completed in spring of 2014.