Harawira, Matthew (2018) Pilot plant to investigate and evaluate the potential of domestic heating using low cost solar generation as a supplemental heat source. [USQ Project]
Abstract
This research investigates the possibility of using a low-cost poly tube solar collector to supply heat in a domestic setting. The investigation is carried out by designing, constructing and evaluating a test bed equipped with a poly tube solar collector that feeds pipework buried below a slab.
Space conditioning and water heating account for more than half of the energy usage in Australian homes. Although a solar collector could easily heat a building during day, in some regions of Australia this is not practical or desirable and night time heating would be preferable. This could be accomplished using solar photovoltaic, whereby solar energy is converted to electrical energy to be stored in batteries for later use. However, these systems are expensive and their performance degrades over time. As an alternative the soil below a concrete slab was used as a thermal sink and heated by a poly tube heat diffuser.
This system was able to provide a measurable increase to the nightly heat emitted by a concrete slab and the findings of this report indicate the considerable potential such a system has when comparing its cost and performance against a solar photovoltaic system given the same task.
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| Item Type: | USQ Project |
|---|---|
| Item Status: | Live Archive |
| Faculty/School / Institute/Centre: | Historic - Faculty of Health, Engineering and Sciences - School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering (1 Jul 2013 - 31 Dec 2021) |
| Supervisors: | Billingsley, John |
| Qualification: | Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) (Mechanical) |
| Date Deposited: | 08 Sep 2021 05:06 |
| Last Modified: | 29 Jun 2023 01:39 |
| URI: | https://sear.unisq.edu.au/id/eprint/40636 |
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