Thermo-economic study of hybrid thermal solar and geothermal heat pumps system in Algeria

Abstract

In this chapter, the sizing and thermo-economic analysis of hybrid solar thermal and ground source heat pump (GSHP) systems for water and space heating and cooling was carried out. The houses selected for the proposed study are located in rural areas at three different climate regions in Algeria. The software RETScreen was used to evaluate the technical and economical feasibility of the hybrid system. The software can be used worldwide to evaluate the energy production and savings, costs, emission reductions, financial viability, and risk for various types of clean energy technologies. Different scenarios into the combined system (geothermal heat pump and thermal solar collectors) have been defined and analyzed using RETScreen software. A comparative analysis of these different scenarios was conducted to determine the best configurations of the hybrid system in terms of energy, economical, and environmental performances. The result of this study showed that this hybrid system is a feasible choice for space conditioning for cooling-heating houses: Annual energy saving is about 15.21 × 106 MWh for 900,000 rural houses during the period 2010-2014. This energy corresponds to the equivalent of 42.12 × 105 oil barrels.