How Reliable Are Standard Thermal Response Tests? An Assessment Based on Long-Term Thermal Response Tests Under Different Operational Conditions

Javier F. Urchueguía, Lenin-Guillermo Lemus-Zúñiga, Jose-Vicente Oliver-Villanueva, Borja Badenes, Miguel A. Mateo Pla and José Manuel Cuevas
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Javier F. Urchueguía: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Lenin-Guillermo Lemus-Zúñiga: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Jose-Vicente Oliver-Villanueva: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Borja Badenes: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Miguel A. Mateo Pla: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain
José Manuel Cuevas: Instituto de Aplicaciones de las Comunicaciones Avanzadas (ITACA), Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera S/N, 46022 Valencia, Spain

Energies, 2018, vol. 11, issue 12, 1-24

Abstract: In this contribution, we analyze the results of a number of thermal response test (TRT) experiments performed during several years at the same location at our university campus in Valencia (Spain), a permeable saturated soil area with possible groundwater flow conditions. A combination of different heat injection rates, TRT operation times of up to 32 days, and various methods for parameter estimation of ground thermal properties have been applied to study their influence on the result and accuracy of TRTs. Our main objective has been to experimentally quantify the influence of groundwater flow heat advection using moving infinite and finite line-source theories, as well as to analyze the influence of factors such as test duration, sensor accuracy, and external thermal influences. We have shown that the traditionally used infinite and finite line-source models, as well as the moving line-source models, can accurately represent experimental temperature evolution, but that there are many caveats regarding the significance parameters extracted and its reproducibility and stability. These features can be improved if data from the first test days are disregarded for the analysis, obtaining a much faster convergence to the definitive soil parameter estimates, including the effective Péclet number that represents groundwater flow in our particular case.

Keywords: shallow geothermal energy; borehole heat exchangers; thermal response test; ground source heat pumps; finite line-source method; moving infinite line-source theory; moving finite line-source theory (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: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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