Effect of pile and heat exchanger properties on total heat extraction of an energy pile - A numerical study

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, 801103, India

^* Corresponding author: rkbag@iitp.ac.in

Abstract

Geothermal energy is one of the potential energy resources to meet future energy demand keeping environmental pollution under control. This paper presents the use of geothermal energy for space heating from energy pile. An energy pile with a single U tube heat exchanger of polyethylene (PE) pipe was modeled in this study. The effect of pile and heat exchanger properties on the total heat extraction was studied by the finite element analysis using COMSOL Multiphysics. The 3D model was developed and validated based on the literature reported results of an experimental thermal performance of a borehole equipped with a single and double U tube heat exchanger. Tetrahedral elements were considered for simulation of a 3D model. The model of a single energy pile of certain dimensions with different soil layers was considered, each soil layers were associated with different temperature. The effect of various parameters such as the length of concrete pile, the diameter of concrete pile, the thickness of U pipe, the inner diameter of U pipe and velocity of fluid inside the U pipe on amount of heat extraction was studied for an energy pile equipped with a single U tube heat exchanger. It was observed that the most influential parameters in increasing the outlet temperature of the heat exchanger loop are the diameter of the concrete pile, the inner diameter of U pipe and the velocity of fluid inside the U pipe.