The application and development of district cooling system in China: A review

District cooling system (DCS) is an emerging building group cooling technology that has been widely used in recent years, scholars in this field have done a lot of research on its development and performance evaluation. This study summarizes the most recent research and development on this topic. In this regards, the integration of DCS with various renewable energy, waste energy, and cold thermal storage (CTS) are discussed in detail. Moreover, the effects of building types, climate zones, and operation control strategy on the performance evaluation and optimization of the DCS are sorted out. Based on the status of DCS projects as described in previous literatures, the existing typical DCS projects are updated after 2015, and their capacities, technologies and user types are classified based on different climate zones. In this work, the future development prospects and main problems of DCS in China are discussed and an outstanding case study is presented. Additionally, the main follow-up research ideas and conclusions based on the case are proposed. The purpose of this study is to show researchers the status quo and main problems of DCS in China, and give constructive suggestions for reference.