Experimental Study to Analyze Feasibility of a Novel Panelized Ground-Source Thermoelectric System for Building Space Heating and Cooling

Rui Miao, Xiaoou Hu, Yao Yu, Qifeng Zhang, Zhibin Lin, Abdulaziz Banawi and Ahmed Cherif Megri
Additional contact information
Rui Miao: Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Xiaoou Hu: Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Yao Yu: Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Qifeng Zhang: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Zhibin Lin: Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Abdulaziz Banawi: Department of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58102, USA
Ahmed Cherif Megri: Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, North Carolina A&T State University, Greensboro, NC 27411, USA

Energies, 2021, vol. 15, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: A thermoelectric module is a device that converts electrical energy into thermal energy through a mechanism known as the Peltier effect. A Peltier device has hot and cold sides/substrates, and heat can be pumped from the cold side to the hot side under a given voltage. By applying it in buildings and attaching it to building envelope components, such as walls, as a heating and cooling device, the heating and cooling requirements can be met by reversing the voltage applied on these two sides/substrates. In this paper, we describe a novel, panelized, ground source, radiant system design for space heating and cooling in buildings by utilizing the Peltier effect. The system is equipped with water pipes that are attached to one side of the panel and connected with a ground loop to exchange heat between the cold/hot sides of the thermoelectric module and the underground region. The ground loop is inserted in boreholes, similar to those used for a vertical closed-loop Ground Source Heat Pump (GSHP) system, which could be more than a hundred meters deep. Experiments were conducted to evaluate the feasibility of the developed panel system applied in buildings. The results show that: (1) the average cooling Coefficients Of Performance (COP) of the system are low (0.6 or less) even though the ground is used as a heat sink, and thus additional studies are needed to improve it in the future, such as to arrange the thermoelectric modules in cascade and/or develop a new thermoelectric material that has a large Seebeck coefficient; and (2) the developed system using the underground region as the heat source has the potential of meeting heating loads of a building while maintaining at a higher system coefficient of performance (up to ~3.0) for space heating, compared to conventional heating devices, such as furnaces or boilers, especially in a region with mild winters and relatively warm ground.

Keywords: thermoelectric module; Peltier effect; ground source heat pump; building (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: 2021
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