Performance Assessment of Horizontal Ground Heat Exchangers under a Greenhouse in Quebec, Canada

Xavier Léveillée-Dallaire (), Jasmin Raymond (), Jónas Þór Snæbjörnsson, Hikari Fujii and Hubert Langevin
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Xavier Léveillée-Dallaire: Centre Eau Terre Environnement, Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique, 490 rue de la Couronne, Québec, QC G1K 9A9, Canada
Jasmin Raymond: Centre Eau Terre Environnement, Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique, 490 rue de la Couronne, Québec, QC G1K 9A9, Canada
Jónas Þór Snæbjörnsson: Iceland School of Energy, Reykjavik University, 102 Reykjavík, Iceland
Hikari Fujii: Graduate School of International Resource Sciences, Akita University, Akita 010-8502, Japan
Hubert Langevin: Géotherma Solutions Inc., Québec, QC G1K 9A9, Canada

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 15, 1-24

Abstract: Among the various approaches to agriculture, urban greenhouse farming has gained attention for its ability to address food security and disruptions to global food supply chains. However, the increasing impact of climate change and global warming necessitates sustainable methods for heating and cooling these greenhouses. In this study, we focused on the potential of slinky-coil horizontal ground heat exchangers (HGHEs) to meet the energy demands of urban greenhouses, assuming they are installed beneath the greenhouse to optimize space utilization. Climate data, an energy consumption profile for a greenhouse being designed in La Pocatière (Québec, Canada) and in-situ ground thermal properties assessments were used to build numerical models using FEFLOW and to evaluate the performance of the HGHEs simulated. Four scenarios were simulated and compared to a base case, considering the greenhouse’s maintenance of a constant temperature above an HGHE limited to the greenhouse’s dimensions. Our findings reveal that a minimum of 7.1% and 26.5% of the total heating and cooling loads of a small greenhouse (133 m 2 area) can be covered by HGHEs installed at a 1.5 m depth when there is no greenhouse above. When installed under a greenhouse with a constant inside temperature of 21 °C, the coverage for heating loads increases to 22.8%, while cooling loads decrease to 24.2%. Sensitivity analysis demonstrates that the constant temperature in the greenhouse reduces the system’s reliance on surface temperature fluctuations for both heating and cooling, albeit with reduced efficiency for cooling.

Keywords: ground-source heat pump; horizontal ground heat exchangers; sustainable energy; numerical simulation; greenhouse heating systems; energy efficiency (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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