Thermal energy storage with a smarter usage at a lower overall cost
VITO developed ThermControlSmartG, a management system for thermal energy storage systems that enables a smarter usage at a lower overall cost.
Thermal energy can be stored underground in large volume systems. This energy can be used for heating and cooling of buildings. Excess summer heat can be used for heating; and excess winter cold can be used for year round air conditioning. In combination with commonly used gas heating and electric cooling, operational costs can be reduced. However, stored thermal energy is finite, and exhaustion is a risk. Systems exist to limit exceedance in temperature ranges and have the classical heating/cooling systems to take over fully when needed. This leads to increased costs and requires classical systems to be designed for supply of the whole energy demand, resulting in large and expensive systems. Improvements would optimize costs of dimensioning installations and consumption.
Advantages
- Lower costs for air conditioning/heating of buildings (both in scale of hardware as in consumption);
- Optimized scaling of heating and cooling systems;
- More sustainable use of available energy;
- Controller system easily integrated in existing hardware already used for control.
Applications
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Underground thermal energy storage systems used for heating and cooling systems of (large) buildings;
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Thermal energy storage systems in cars, computers, tooling machines…;
- Battery Management System providers (BSM).
Publications
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