The growth of the Chinese district heating sector has been very rapid during recent years. No other country in the world can show the same rapid growth of district heating systems during the last decades. Heated building area increased six times between 1995 and 2008 according to the Chinese district heating statistics. China has also enjoyed strong growth of scientific articles and papers published about district heating in recent years. During 2010-2012, one third of all international scientific journal articles and conference papers about district heating came from Chinese scientists, while Swedish researchers accounted for one quarter. It is important to identify the Chinese district heating and cooling research to judge the potential for future collaborative research on district heating systems between Sweden/Europe and China. Until 2013, Chinese district heating and cooling scientists have published 205 international publications on district heating and 36 publications on district cooling. In this paper, these articles are mapped and summarised with respect to topics, active research institutions, and their technology focuses. Another approach is to grasp the Chinese interest for more diversified heat supply, since many new systems are established and thereby have more degrees of freedom when choosing by various heat supply and technology options.