The UK government’s Carbon Plan-2011 aims for 80% carbon emission reduction by 2050, and the 2009 UK National Renewable Energy Action Plan has set a target of delivering 15% of total energy demand by renewable energy sources by 2020. Ground Source Heat Pump (GSHP) systems can play a critical role in reaching these goals within the building sector. Achieving such benefits relies on proper design, integration, installation, commissioning, and operation of these systems. This work seeks to provide evidence to improve the practices in design, installation and operations of large GSHP systems. This evidence has been based on collection and analysis of data from an operational large-scale GSHP system providing heating and cooling to a university building. The data set is of significance in that it is collected from a large-scale system incorporating fifty-six borehole heat exchangers and four heat pumps. The data has been collected at high frequency since the start of operation and for a period of three years. The borehole heat exchanger data is intended to form a reference data set for use by other workers in model validation studies. The ground thermal properties at the site have been estimated using a novel combination of numerical model and parameter estimation methods. The utility of the reference data set has been demonstrated through application in a validation study of a numerical borehole heat exchanger model. The system heat balances and power consumption data have firstly been analysed to derive a range of performance metrics such as Seasonal Performance Factors. Analysis has been carried out at the system and individual heat pump level. Annual performance has been found satisfactory overall. A series of analyses have been carried out to investigate the roles of circulating pump energy, control system operation and dynamic behaviour. Monitoring data from one of the heat pumps has also been analysed in further detail to make comparisons with manufacturer’s steady-state performance data and with consideration to variations in fluid properties. Some modest degradation from stated performance has been identified. The most significant operational factors accounting for degradation of overall system performance have been excessive pump energy demands and short cycling behaviour. Some faults in operation of the system during the monitoring period have also been identified. A series of recommendations are made as to ways to improve the design and operation of large-scale GSHP systems based on this evidence. These recommendations are chiefly concerned with better design for part-load operation, reduction in pump energy demands and more robust control systems.

In the context of energy transition, geothermics play an important role for the heating and cooling supply of both residential and commercial buildings. Thereby, the increasingly and intensive utilisation of shallow geothermal resources bears the risk of over-exploitation and thus poses a future challenge to ensure the sustainability and safety of such systems. Particularly, the well-established technology of borehole heat exchanger-coupled ground source heat pumps is applied for the thermal exploitation of the shallow subsurface. Due to the complexity of the involved physical processes, numerical modelling proves to be a powerful tool to enhance process understanding as well as to aid the planning and design processes. Simulations can also support the management of thermal subsurface resources, planning and decision-making on city and regional scales. In this work, the so-called dual-continuum approach was adopted and enhanced to develop a coupled numerical model considering flow and heat transport processes in both the subsurface and borehole heat exchangers as well as the heat pumps’ performance characteristics, and including the relevant phenomena influencing the underlying processes. Beside the temperature fields, the efficiency and thus the consumption of electrical energy by the heat pump is computed, allowing for the quantification of operational costs and equivalent carbon-dioxide emissions. The model is validated and applied to a number of numerical studies. First, a comprehensive sensitivity analysis on the efficiency and sustainability of such systems is performed. Second, a method for the quantification of technically extractable shallow geothermal energy is proposed. This procedure is demonstrated by means of a case study for the city of Cologne, Germany and its implications are discussed. / Im Rahmen der Energiewende nimmt die Geothermie eine besondere Rolle in der thermische Gebäudeversorgung ein. Die zunehmende, intensive Nutzung oberflächennaher geothermischer Ressourcen erhöht die Gefahr der übermäßigen thermischen Ausbeutung des Untergrundes und stellt damit eine wachsende Herausforderung für die Nachhaltigkeit und Sicherheit solcher Systeme dar. Zur Erschließung oberflächennaher geothermischer Energie wird insbesondere die etablierte Technologie Erdwärmesonden-gekoppelter Wärmepumpen eingesetzt. Aufgrund der daran beteiligten komplexen physikalischen Prozesse erweisen sich numerische Modelle als leistungsfähiges Werkzeug zur Erweiterung des Prozessverständnisses und Unterstützung des Planungs- und Auslegungsprozesses. Zudem können Simulationen zum Management thermischer Ressourcen im Untergrund sowie zur Planung und politischen Entscheidungsfindung auf städtischen und regionalen Maßstäben beitragen. Im Rahmen dieser Arbeit wurde, basierend auf dem sogenannten ”dual-continuum approach” und unter Berücksichtigung des Einflusses der Wärmepumpe, ein erweitertes gekoppeltes numerisches Modell zur Abbildung der in Erdwärmesonden und dem Untergrund stattfindenden Strömungs- und Wärmetransportprozesse entwickelt. Das Modell ist in der Lage, alle relevanten Einflussfaktoren zu berücksichtigen. Neben den Temperaturfeldern im Untergrund und der Erdwärmesonde werden die Effizienz und damit der Stromverbrauch der Wärmepumpe simuliert. Damit können sowohl die Betriebskosten als auch der äquivalente CO 2 -Ausstoß abgeschätzt werden. Das Modell wurde validiert und in einer Reihe numerischer Studien eingesetzt. Zuerst wurde eine umfassende Sensitivitätsanalyse zur Effizienz und Nachhaltigkeit entsprechender Anlagen durchgeführt. Weiterhin wird ein Verfahren zur Quantifizierung des technisch nutzbaren, oberflächennahen geothermischen Potentials vorgestellt und anhand einer Fallstudie für die Stadt Köln demonstriert, gefolgt von einer Diskussion der Ergebnisse.

A PhD dissertation which presented a numerical modelling study on the long-term behavior in the multiple borehole heat exchanger array system for sustainable utilisation of shallow geothermal energy.