Performance Monitoring of a Ground Source Heat Pump System with a Horizontal GHE in Los Humeros, Puebla, México

Abstract

Ground Source Heat Pumps (GSHP) provide a new and clean way to condition buildings, it is one of the most efficient systems for heating and cooling buildings. The GSHP systems use ground heat exchangers (GHEs) to transfer heat to/from the ground to efficiently provide clean-purpose renewable energy. Currently, its use has increased worldwide, because they make use of renewable energy stored in the ground, using geothermal energy. This paper presents the assessment of the general performances of one GSHP system installed in a kindergarten building “Tierra y Libertad” at Los Humeros, Puebla, México being the first project demonstrative installed in México to heating the building. The system consists of a vertical heat pump unit (water-to-air) with a horizontal heat exchanger system type slinky into three trenches. Basic parameters of its operation were monitored by a data acquisition system, for example, the temperatures of air on the user and buried-pipes side, the electrical power, and current consumption of the pump. Based on the building data, this work focuses on the system installation process and the analysis of some parameters to determine the coefficient of performance (COP) average. The results were obtained from a short data storage period from July 2008 to April 2009. The experimental results indicate that the average heat-pump COP is distributed between 3.4 to 3.8.