Solar District Heating Model for an Azimuth-Tracking Floating Concentrator on a Seasonal-Heat-Storage Reservoir

2nd Annual Systems Simulation and Economic Analysis Conference. Jan. 23-25, 1980, San Diego, California, Sponsored by Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI)The development of a computer model which sizes the floating concentrator and seasonal heat-storage reservoir needed to operate solar district heating and-cooling systems is reported. A prediction of the water temperature variation with time in the storage reservoir is obtained using a Fourlar series type analysis. The model has been applied to districts composed of 10, 50 and 250 individual residences. A 4459 m2 (98,000 ft2) circular collector on a 10.7 m (35 ft) deep reservoir will provide the 250-home subdivision with 100 percent of the space heating and domestic hot water in an average year. This is approximately 17.8 m2 (192 ft2) per home which is one-third that required without annual storage. This reduction in area should more than compensate for the cost of insulation and distribution of the hot water from the patented centralized collector system. A utility operated system would have the convenience and dependability that consumers are now experiencing with non-renewable sources of thermal energy.This item is part of the Water Resources Research Center collection. It was digitized from a physical copy provided by the Water Resources Research Center at The University of Arizona. For more information about items in this collection, please contact the Center, (520) 621-9591 or see http://wrrc.arizona.edu