Will energy harvested from the movement of pedestrians in high foot-traffic locales be the next big trend in renewable energy? Karl Sundholm, of the Swedish state-held property administration company Jernhuset, seems to think so.

He plans on using the body heat generated from the approximate 250,000 people that pass through Stockholm Central Station (the largest train station in both Sweden and the Nordic Region) on a daily basis to generate heat for a nearby development that will include a hotel, office building and retail space.

How will this work?

Instead of opening up the windows and letting all that heat go to waste, the buildings ventilation system will suck in the hot air and use it to warm up water that is running through a series of pipes inside the stations walls. This warmed water will then be pumped into the new building where it can be used to heat the spaces inside.

“This is old technology, but used in a new way. It’s just pipes, water and pumps, but we haven’t heard of anyone else using this technology in this way before,” Sundholm said.

Implementation of the proposed system is expected to reduce heating costs in the new building by up to 20 percent.

Via: Physorg