At HOMAG’s Holzbronn site in the Black Forest, Germany, a major production facility for woodworking machinery required a future-ready heating solution that would support the company’s decarbonisation goals without compromising process stability, operational reliability, or comfort. The existing heat supply was based on four oil-fired boilers, which no longer aligned with the site’s long-term sustainability objectives.
To address this, HOMAG implemented a new heat pump-based system of 2.3 MW capacity. The system combines six Trane CXAF air-to-water heat pumps with one Trane RTSF high-temperature water-to-water heat pump. Together, these systems can cover both low-temperature and high-temperature applications, providing the flexibility required in industrial applications, while also enabling cooling for office areas through reversible operation of the CXAF units.
Uptime is critical in industrial environments, so keeping production running while installing and integrating such a complex system was set to be a challenge. To solve this, the project team took an innovative approach. Using 3D camera technology, engineers captured detailed photography and used it to create a realistic 3D model. This model allowed the construction team at Gottfriend Braun to pre-fabricate the plant rooms off-site, including manifolds, buffer tank connections, hydraulic modules and all relevant built-in components. Finally, these were delivered to HOMAG as a modular plug-and-play containerised solution.
This approach reduced installation time, minimised disruption to production, and ensured precise integration into the existing infrastructure. The result is a scalable, efficient, and reliable industrial heating solution that demonstrates how companies in energy-intensive sectors can successfully replace fossil fuel systems in demanding manufacturing environments, without compromising on productivity.
