Improving Water-Loop Heat Pump Performance by Using Low Temperature Geothermal Fluid

Abstract

Water-loop heat pump are an important option for space conditioning of commercial buildings. They provide the opportunity of saving energy through heat recovery and thermal balancing when heating and cooling occur simultaneously. WLHP systems operate with water temperature between and When cooling loads dominate, loop water temperatures are maintained below by rejecting excess heat a cooling tower. When heating dominates, loop water temperatures are above by a heater input. The capacity efficiencyof water-source heat pumps (WSHP) both operating modes are strongfunctions of the inlet water temperature.

The emphasis of this paper is on the system performances, energy savings of the mixed cooling and heating mode of the systems for it is a operating mode in the air-conditioning and space heating systems. The energy savingeffect by using lowtemperature geothermal as the heat input for WLHP systems was examined.