OGRANICZENIA I EFEKTYWNOŚĆ WYKORZYSTANIA SPRĘŻARKOWYCH POMP CIEPŁA W POLSKICH CIEPŁOWNIACH GEOTERMALNYCH

Abstract

RESTRICTIONS ON USE AND EFFECTIVENESS OF COMPRESSOR HEAT PUMPS IN GEOTHERMAL HEATING PLANTS IN POLAND Abstract. The paper presents the technical and economic conditions that compressor heat pumps have to cope with in the Polish heating systems utilizing geothermal water. Required operating parameters of geothermal installations and the structure of energy consumption used for production of electricity driven heat pumps were taken into consideration. Given the existing restrictions, the terms of energy and economic viability of compressor heat pumps were determined. It was found that the least demanding criterion of effectiveness for compressor heat pumps utilization in Poland is the criterion of primary energy saving effectiveness (taking coal as the reference fuel it is necessary to obtain the annual average COP value above 2.2 – which is fully achievable). A definitely more stringent criterion is the economic viability. It was found that, for the most commonly used conventional fuels, the average COP value must be 5.0–7.7 for coal, 3.3–5.6 for network natural gas with a high methane content, 1.7–2.0 for light heating oil and 1.0–1.4 for network electricity. On this basis, the economic viability of compressor heat pumps for coal is practically unattainable.