IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v15y2022i5p1801-d761145.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Improvements in the Water Retention Characteristics and Thermophysical Parameters of Backfill Material in Ground Source Heat Pumps by a Molecular Sieve

Author

Listed:
  • Tingting Luo

    (Mining College, Guizhou University, Guiyang 550025, China
    College of Materials and Metallurgy, Guizhou University, Guiyang 550025, China)

  • Peng Pei

    (Mining College, Guizhou University, Guiyang 550025, China)

  • Yixia Chen

    (Mining College, Guizhou University, Guiyang 550025, China)

  • Dingyi Hao

    (Key Laboratory of Deep Coal Resource Mining, Ministry of Education, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou 221116, China)

  • Chen Wang

    (Mining College, Guizhou University, Guiyang 550025, China)

Abstract

The thermophysical properties of backfill material (BM) in a heat exchange borehole significantly influence the heat exchange effect of ground source heat pumps (GSHPs). Several treatments such as compaction and adding bentonite, cement, and fine sands are often used to improve the thermophysical properties. In this study, a 3A molecular sieve (3A-MS), a type of porous material, was added to the BM to enhance its water maintaining capacity. Three types of backfill materials with different additive contents, named as BM-0, BM-1, and BM-2, were examined. The variation of the BM properties such as the soil–water characteristic curve (SWCC), thermal conductivity, specific heat capacity, and thermal diffusivity with the groundwater content were investigated through a series of experiments and simulations. A scanning electron microscope (SEM), an energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS), and the BET method for specific surface area pore size analysis were used to characterize the material. The results indicated that the specific heat capacity improved with the water content whereas the thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity decreased with the water content. The variation of the buried pipe outlet temperature with the change of the thermal physical parameters of the BM were researched by a numerical simulation and theoretical calculations; the results showed that BM-2 could raise the heat transfer rate per meter by 45.9% in summer and 118.4% in winter compared with the backfill materials without groundwater (NW). The research results provide theoretical support for the improvement of BM for ground source heat pump projects where abundant groundwater is available.

Suggested Citation

  • Tingting Luo & Peng Pei & Yixia Chen & Dingyi Hao & Chen Wang, 2022. "Improvements in the Water Retention Characteristics and Thermophysical Parameters of Backfill Material in Ground Source Heat Pumps by a Molecular Sieve," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-15, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:15:y:2022:i:5:p:1801-:d:761145
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/5/1801/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/15/5/1801/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Weisong Zhou & Peng Pei & Dingyi Hao & Chen Wang, 2020. "A Numerical Study on the Performance of Ground Heat Exchanger Buried in Fractured Rock Bodies," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-17, April.
    2. Khosravi, N. & Abdolmohammadi, H.R. & Bagheri, S. & Miveh, M.R., 2021. "Improvement of harmonic conditions in the AC/DC microgrids with the presence of filter compensation modules," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    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. Tingting Luo & Peng Pei & Jianan Wu & Chen Wang & Long Tang, 2022. "Research on the Application of Fracture Water to Mitigate the Thermal Imbalance of a Rock Mass Associated with the Operation of Ground-Coupled Heat Pumps," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-13, September.
    2. Krzysztof Seńczuk & Aneta Sapińska-Śliwa & Tomasz Kowalski, 2022. "Utilization of Basalt Dust as Waste Material in Cement Grouts for Geothermal Application," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(19), pages 1-30, September.

    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. Aneta Sapińska-Śliwa & Tomasz Sliwa & Kazimierz Twardowski & Krzysztof Szymski & Andrzej Gonet & Paweł Żuk, 2020. "Method of Averaging the Effective Thermal Conductivity Based on Thermal Response Tests of Borehole Heat Exchangers," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(14), pages 1-20, July.
    2. Manuel Flota-Bañuelos & Homero Miranda-Vidales & Bernardo Fernández & Luis J. Ricalde & A. Basam & J. Medina, 2022. "Harmonic Compensation via Grid-Tied Three-Phase Inverter with Variable Structure I&I Observer-Based Control Scheme," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-19, September.
    3. Hang Zou & Peng Pei & Chen Wang & Dingyi Hao, 2021. "A numerical study on heat transfer performances of horizontal ground heat exchangers in ground-source heat pumps," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(5), pages 1-19, May.
    4. Tingting Luo & Peng Pei & Jianan Wu & Chen Wang & Long Tang, 2022. "Research on the Application of Fracture Water to Mitigate the Thermal Imbalance of a Rock Mass Associated with the Operation of Ground-Coupled Heat Pumps," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-13, September.
    5. Minh Ly Duc & Lukas Hlavaty & Petr Bilik & Radek Martinek, 2023. "Harmonic Mitigation Using Meta-Heuristic Optimization for Shunt Adaptive Power Filters: A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(10), pages 1-55, May.

    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:15:y:2022:i:5:p:1801-:d:761145. 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.