Page 53 - Demo Faces

On a winter morning in Nur-Sultan City, Kazakhstan, temperatures can go as low as –25°C, making it di cult to start a vehicle. Once started, vehicles consume about 25% more fuel after a cold start below zero, and the idling time while drivers turn on the engine to get their vehicles going generates gas emissions that are both unpleasant and harmful to the environment. Block heater technology, which heats up an engine using a plug-in electrical device, has been in use in Canada and Scandinavian countries for decades, but it hadn’t been adopted in Kazakhstan.
A pilot project in Nur-Sultan City introduced this technology, installing the required block heater electric outlets at seven locations, supplying mechanical components from Finland, Sweden, and Norway, and training automotive mechanics. By February 2020, the project was due to have installed 100 engine block heaters in taxis and public cars. Using this technology can have big environmental gains. A typical car uses 540 less liters of fuel a year, and even after factoring in emissions for producing the electricity needed, this technology still reduces air pollution, producing 1,200 kilograms less carbon emissions
a year. In 2 or 3 years, at a cost of $15 per year, the technology pays for itself.
Find out more:
Regional: Promoting Low-Carbon Development in Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation Program Cities
Read more about block heater technology:
How Block Heater Technology Can Reduce Carbon and Air Pollution
“We’re negotiating with the local government to see how much investments they need to cover whole parking lots, shopping centers, and o ce buildings. The technology has a good future because, with 350,000 cars in the country, wide deployment could reduce fuel consumption by over 220 million liters and reduce carbon emissions by over 430,000 tons for the city as a whole. When you show those gures to the government, they understand the impact.”
Na Won Kim
Senior Environment Specialist, Sustainable Infrastructure Division, East Asia Department
53
Technology