Optimized energy recovery in line with balancing of an ATES

The present study explores the potential imbalance problem of the Aquifer Thermal Energy Storage (ATES) system at the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) campus, Eindhoven. This ATES is one of the largest European aquifer thermal energy storage systems, and has a seasonal imbalance problem. Reasons for this issue may be the high cooling demand from laboratories, office buildings and the direct ATES cooling system. Annually, cooling towers use on average 250 MWh electricity for the removal of about 5 GWh of excess heat from the ATES to the surroundings. In addition, the TU/e uses a large amount of natural gas for heating purposes and especially for peak supplies. Recovering the surplus heat of the ATES, a CO2 Trans-critical Heat Pump (HP) system to cover particularly peak demands and total heating demand is proposed, modeled and optimized. The model is validated using data from International Energy Agency. Based on simulation results, 708294 nm3 of natural gas are saved where two different scenarios were considered for the ATES efficiency, cost saving and green house gas reduction. In scenario I, the COP of the ATES increased up to 50% by which K€ 303.3 energy cost and 1288.5 ton CO2 are saved annually. On the other hand, it will be shown that the ATES COP in Scenario II will improve up to 20%. In addition, the proposed energy recovery system results in a 606 ton CO2 -reduction and K€152.7 energy cost saving for the university each year