IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v14y2021i7p1923-d527312.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Integration of Photovoltaic Electricity with Shallow Geothermal Systems for Residential Microgrids: Proof of Concept and Techno-Economic Analysis with RES2GEO Model

Author

Listed:
  • Luka Perković

    (Geology and Petroleum Engineering, Faculty of Mining, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia)

  • Domagoj Leko

    (Terra Energy Generation Company d.o.o., 10000 Zagreb, Croatia)

  • Amalia Lekić Brettschneider

    (Geology and Petroleum Engineering, Faculty of Mining, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia)

  • Hrvoje Mikulčić

    (MOE Key Laboratory of Thermo-Fluid Science and Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an 710049, China
    Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia)

  • Petar S. Varbanov

    (Sustainable Process Integration Laboratory—SPIL, NETME Centre, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Brno University of Technology—VUT BRNO, 616 69 Brno, Czech Republic)

Abstract

The European Union aims to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions by 55% before 2030 compared to 1990 as a reference year. One of the main contributions to GHG emissions comes from the household sector. This paper shows that the household sector, when organised into a form of prosumer microgrids, including renewable sources for electric, heating and cooling energy supply, can be efficiently decarbonised. This paper investigates one hypothetical prosumer microgrid with the model RES2GEO (Renewable Energy Sources to Geothermal). The aim is to integrate a carbon-free photovoltaic electricity source and a shallow geothermal reservoir as a heat source and heat sink during the heating and cooling season. A total of four cases have been evaluated for the Zagreb City location. The results represent a balance of both thermal and electric energy flows within the microgrid, as well as thermal recuperation of the reservoir. The levelised cost of energy for all cases, based on a 20-year modelling horizon, varies between 41 and 63 EUR/MWh. On the other hand, all cases show a decrease in CO 2 emissions by more than 75%, with the best case featuring a reduction of more than 85% compared to the base case, where electricity and gas for heating are supplied from the Distribution System Operator at retail prices. With the use of close integration of electricity, heating and cooling demand and supply of energy, cost-effective decarbonisation can be achieved for the household sector.

Suggested Citation

  • Luka Perković & Domagoj Leko & Amalia Lekić Brettschneider & Hrvoje Mikulčić & Petar S. Varbanov, 2021. "Integration of Photovoltaic Electricity with Shallow Geothermal Systems for Residential Microgrids: Proof of Concept and Techno-Economic Analysis with RES2GEO Model," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-21, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:7:p:1923-:d:527312
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/7/1923/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/7/1923/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dalla Longa, Francesco & Nogueira, Larissa P. & Limberger, Jon & Wees, Jan-Diederik van & van der Zwaan, Bob, 2020. "Scenarios for geothermal energy deployment in Europe," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    2. Amjad Ali & Wuhua Li & Rashid Hussain & Xiangning He & Barry W. Williams & Abdul Hameed Memon, 2017. "Overview of Current Microgrid Policies, Incentives and Barriers in the European Union, United States and China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(7), pages 1-28, June.
    3. Kljajić, Miroslav V. & Anđelković, Aleksandar S. & Hasik, Vaclav & Munćan, Vladimir M. & Bilec, Melissa, 2020. "Shallow geothermal energy integration in district heating system: An example from Serbia," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 147(P2), pages 2791-2800.
    4. Perry, Simon & Klemeš, Jiří & Bulatov, Igor, 2008. "Integrating waste and renewable energy to reduce the carbon footprint of locally integrated energy sectors," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 33(10), pages 1489-1497.
    5. Lyu, Weihua & Li, Xianting & Yan, Shuai & Jiang, Sihang, 2020. "Utilizing shallow geothermal energy to develop an energy efficient HVAC system," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 147(P1), pages 672-682.
    6. Ramos-Escudero, Adela & García-Cascales, M. Socorro & Cuevas, Jose M. & Sanner, Burkhard & Urchueguía, Javier F., 2021. "Spatial analysis of indicators affecting the exploitation of shallow geothermal energy at European scale," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 266-281.
    7. Walch, Alina & Mohajeri, Nahid & Gudmundsson, Agust & Scartezzini, Jean-Louis, 2021. "Quantifying the technical geothermal potential from shallow borehole heat exchangers at regional scale," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 165(P1), pages 369-380.
    8. Ana Vieira & Maria Alberdi-Pagola & Paul Christodoulides & Saqib Javed & Fleur Loveridge & Frederic Nguyen & Francesco Cecinato & João Maranha & Georgios Florides & Iulia Prodan & Gust Van Lysebetten , 2017. "Characterisation of Ground Thermal and Thermo-Mechanical Behaviour for Shallow Geothermal Energy Applications," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(12), pages 1-51, December.
    9. Bu, Xianbiao & Ran, Yunmin & Zhang, Dongdong, 2019. "Experimental and simulation studies of geothermal single well for building heating," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 1902-1909.
    10. Casasso, Alessandro & Sethi, Rajandrea, 2016. "G.POT: A quantitative method for the assessment and mapping of the shallow geothermal potential," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 765-773.
    11. Sarwo Edhy Sofyan & Eric Hu & Andrei Kotousov & Teuku Meurah Indra Riayatsyah & Razali Thaib, 2020. "Mathematical Modelling and Operational Analysis of Combined Vertical–Horizontal Heat Exchanger for Shallow Geothermal Energy Application in Cooling Mode," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(24), pages 1-20, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Abdelazim Abbas Ahmed & Mohsen Assadi & Adib Kalantar & Tomasz Sliwa & Aneta Sapińska-Śliwa, 2022. "A Critical Review on the Use of Shallow Geothermal Energy Systems for Heating and Cooling Purposes," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-22, June.
    2. Potrč, Sanja & Nemet, Andreja & Čuček, Lidija & Varbanov, Petar Sabev & Kravanja, Zdravko, 2022. "Synthesis of a regenerative energy system – beyond carbon emissions neutrality," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    3. Macedon Moldovan & Bogdan-Gabriel Burduhos & Ion Visa, 2021. "Yearly Electrical Energy Assessment of a Photovoltaic Platform/Geothermal Heat Pump Prosumer," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-18, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chang, Honglin & Kong, Gangqiang & Liu, Hanlong, 2025. "Estimation of the technical geothermal potential through energy piles at a small regional scale: A campus case study," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 320(C).
    2. Mohd Alsaleh & Xiaohui Wang, 2023. "How Does Information and Communication Technology Affect Geothermal Energy Sustainability?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-21, January.
    3. Hu, Ziyuan & Gao, Zongjun & Xu, Xiqiang & Fang, Shaoyan & Zhou, Liangyu & Ji, Deshuai & Li, Fuquan & Feng, Jianguo & Wang, Min, 2022. "Suitability zoning of buried pipe ground source heat pump and shallow geothermal resource evaluation of Linqu County, Shandong Province, China," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 198(C), pages 1430-1439.
    4. Manz, Pia & Billerbeck, Anna & Kök, Ali & Fallahnejad, Mostafa & Fleiter, Tobias & Kranzl, Lukas & Braungardt, Sibylle & Eichhammer, Wolfgang, 2024. "Spatial analysis of renewable and excess heat potentials for climate-neutral district heating in Europe," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 224(C).
    5. Walch, Alina & Li, Xiang & Chambers, Jonathan & Mohajeri, Nahid & Yilmaz, Selin & Patel, Martin & Scartezzini, Jean-Louis, 2022. "Shallow geothermal energy potential for heating and cooling of buildings with regeneration under climate change scenarios," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 244(PB).
    6. Miocic, Johannes M. & Krecher, Marc, 2022. "Estimation of shallow geothermal potential to meet building heating demand on a regional scale," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 629-640.
    7. Sławomir Kurpaska & Mirosław Janowski & Maciej Gliniak & Anna Krakowiak-Bal & Urszula Ziemiańczyk, 2021. "The Use of Geothermal Energy to Heating Crops under Cover: A Case Study of Poland," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(9), pages 1-25, May.
    8. Brancher, Marlon & Steiner, Cornelia & Hoyer, Stefan, 2025. "Spatio-temporal diffusion of groundwater heat pumps across Austria: A long-term multi-metric trend analysis (1990–2022)," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 383(C).
    9. Korhonen, Kimmo & Markó, Ábel & Bischoff, Alan & Szijártó, Márk & Mádl-Szőnyi, Judit, 2023. "Infinite borehole field model—a new approach to estimate the shallow geothermal potential of urban areas applied to central Budapest, Hungary," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 263-274.
    10. Wengang Qu & Chao Yang & Hui Qian & Panpan Xu & Yanyan Gao & Leiqiang Wei & Qi Long, 2024. "Geothermal Condition Investigation and Resource Potential Evaluation of Shallow Geothermal Energy in the Yinchuan Area, Ningxia, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(24), pages 1-30, December.
    11. Elisa Heim & Marius Laska & Ralf Becker & Norbert Klitzsch, 2022. "Estimating the Subsurface Thermal Conductivity and Its Uncertainty for Shallow Geothermal Energy Use—A Workflow and Geoportal Based on Publicly Available Data," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(10), pages 1-19, May.
    12. Restrepo, Mauricio & Cañizares, Claudio A. & Simpson-Porco, John W. & Su, Peter & Taruc, John, 2021. "Optimization- and Rule-based Energy Management Systems at the Canadian Renewable Energy Laboratory microgrid facility," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 290(C).
    13. Cassina, Lisa & Laloui, Lyesse & Rotta Loria, Alessandro F., 2022. "Thermal interactions among vertical geothermal borehole fields," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 1204-1220.
    14. Varbanov, Petar Sabev & Fodor, Zsófia & Klemeš, Jiří Jaromír, 2012. "Total Site targeting with process specific minimum temperature difference (ΔTmin)," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 20-28.
    15. Gassner, Martin & Maréchal, François, 2009. "Thermodynamic comparison of the FICFB and Viking gasification concepts," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 34(10), pages 1744-1753.
    16. Li, Xiang & Yilmaz, Selin & Patel, Martin K. & Chambers, Jonathan, 2023. "Techno-economic analysis of fifth-generation district heating and cooling combined with seasonal borehole thermal energy storage," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 285(C).
    17. Charles Maragna & Fleur Loveridge, 2021. "A New Approach for Characterizing Pile Heat Exchangers Using Thermal Response Tests," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-18, June.
    18. Vivek Aggarwal & Chandan Swaroop Meena & Ashok Kumar & Tabish Alam & Anuj Kumar & Arijit Ghosh & Aritra Ghosh, 2020. "Potential and Future Prospects of Geothermal Energy in Space Conditioning of Buildings: India and Worldwide Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(20), pages 1-19, October.
    19. Younes Zahraoui & Ibrahim Alhamrouni & Saad Mekhilef & M. Reyasudin Basir Khan & Mehdi Seyedmahmoudian & Alex Stojcevski & Ben Horan, 2021. "Energy Management System in Microgrids: A Comprehensive Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(19), pages 1-33, September.
    20. Yujiang He & Xianbiao Bu, 2020. "Performance of Hybrid Single Well Enhanced Geothermal System and Solar Energy for Buildings Heating," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-10, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:7:p:1923-:d:527312. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.