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Energy Procedia 61 (2014) 1977 1981

The 6th International Conference on Applied Energy ICAE2014

Theoretical analysis on the solid sensible and latent heat

storage in building cooling heating and power systems
Xiaoguo Teng1,2, Xin Wang1,*
1 Department of Building Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, 2 Beijing Gas Energy Development Co.,Ltd, Beijing,
100101

Abstract
Thermal Energy Storage (TES) is an important technology to balance the hourly energy supply and demand in
Building Cooling Heating and Power (BCHP) systems, aiming to lower primary energy consumption. The solid
sensible TES and latent TES, which are relatively developed, have the potential to be generalized in BCHP systems.
However, design problems such as what are the key parameters or how to get the optimal value for this specific
application remain unclear. The objective of this paper is to give a theoretical method to solve those two problems.
The fixed storage period constraint is taken into consideration, which was important but not considered in the
published articles. Firstly, a new evaluation index called the non-dimensional cooling capacity is defined to evaluate
the thermal performance of TES. Secondly, the key non-dimensional design parameters are found based on the
mathematical model. Finally, the sensitivity analysis of those parameters is studied. The results can be applied to
further understand TES in BCHP systems and are helpful to design BCHP systems.

Authors.
Published
by Elsevier
Ltd. This
is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
2014
2014The
The
Authors.
Published
by Elsevier
Ltd.
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of ICAE
Peer-review under responsibility of the Organizing Committee of ICAE2014

Keywords: TES, energy efficiency, phase change, BCHP, thermal capacity

1. Introduction
BCHP systems have been developed a lot in recent years due to its high energy efficiency and low
carbon emission. However, some of the current BCHP systems built in China work in poor thermal
performance because the energy supply does not match the demand. Thermal Energy Storage (TES) is a
feasible technology to balance the energy supply and demand, lower the gas turbine capacity and the
primary energy consumption for a given building load [1]. Arteconi et. al. [2] stated the important

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +86-10-62796113; fax: +86-10-62773461.

E-mail address: wangxinlj@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn.

1876-6102 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the Organizing Committee of ICAE2014
doi:10.1016/j.egypro.2014.12.056

1978

Xiaoguo Teng and Xin Wang / Energy Procedia 61 (2014) 1977 1981

evaluation indexes for performance are the energy storage capacity, the charging/discharging rate, and the
storage density and so on. For sensible energy storage, water is the common media. The main factor for
the performance is the thermal stratification efficiency [3]. Celador [4] introduced three different models for
hot water storage to size BCHP systems. For latent energy storage, the melting temperature and device
size are very important for performance. Bjurstrm, Carlsson 0 and Adebiyi 0gave the analytical method to
calculate the optimal melting temperature with infinite discharging time. Shabgard [7] took the fixed
storage period into consideration to quantify the performance of latent heat thermal energy storage.
However, the design of TES remains unclear in BCHP systems, such as what are the key parameters or
how to get the optimal value for this specific application, etc. and the constraint of limited storage period
should be considered. The objective of this paper is to give the theoretical analysis for designing solid
sensible TES and latent TES for BCHP system applications, in which the limited storage period constraint
is considered.
2. System configuration and evaluation index
The BCHP system shown in Fig.1 is composed of a gas turbine, a TES device and an absorption heat
pump, operating in grid parallel mode. Gas turbine works in the rated condition. One-dimensional heat
transfer model is applied for TES. The outlet temperature of Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF) equals to that of
the storage material based on the following assumptions: 1) The heat loss to the environment is neglected;
2) The Number of Transfer Unit (NTU) of the TES device is infinite; 3) The heat conduction coefficient
of the storage material is infinite. The Coefficient of Performance (COP) of the absorption heat pump
varies in accordance with the inlet temperature of the generator. Other factors are neglected. When the
gas turbine capacity is given, the non-dimensional cooling capacity within the given storage period is
defined by,


Fig.1 Structure of the BCHP system working with TES

(1)
CQeff=Qeff /(mc,f cp,f T0 tcyc)
Where, Qeff,CQeff is the cooling capacity, kJ and its non-dimensional parameter, respectively; mc,f/ the
mass flow of HTF in charging/discharging process, kJ/(K s); cp,f, the reference specific heat capacity of
HTF at T0, J/(kg K); T0, the reference surrounding temperature, 303K in summer; tcyc, the given storage
period, 86400 s.
3. Theoretical analysis

1979

Xiaoguo Teng and Xin Wang / Energy Procedia 61 (2014) 1977 1981

For the solid sensible TES, the non-dimensional cooling capacity can be calculated in Equation
(1~5). All the temperatures appeared in those equations can be non-dimensionalized by Equation (6). The
non-dimensional thermal capacity of the storage material is defined by Equation (7). The
charging/discharging mass flow ratio is defined by Equation (8). As indicated from the Equations (1) ~
(8), the non-dimensional cooling capacity,CQeff depends on the non-dimensional initial temperature ,
the non-dimensional thermal capacity of the storage materialCCp and the charging/discharging mass flow
ratioCrcd.
Tc,i-Tc,o(tc)=(Tc,i-Ta)exp(-mc,f cp,f tc/(Mp cp,p)), Td,o(td)-Td,i=(Tb-Td,i)exp(-md,f cp,f td/(Mp cp,p))
Tc,i (Tc,i-Ta)exp(-mc,f cp,f tc,max/(Mp cp,p))= Td,i+(Tb-Td,i),
Tc,i (Tc,i-Ta)= Td,i+(Tb-Td,i) exp(-md,f cp,f td,max/(Mp cp,p))
tc,max+td,max=tcyc
Qeff

t d ,max

md , f c p , f (Td , o  Td , i ) X 1  Tc / Td , o  Te / Tc  Te  dt d

(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)

(6)
Ti=Ti /T0
(7)
Cp=Mp cp,p /(mc,f cp,f tcyc)
(8)
rcd=mc,f /md,f
Where, Tc,i/Td,i, is the inlet HTF temperature in charging/discharging process, K; Tc,o/Td,o, the outlet HTF
temperature in charging/discharging process, K; Ta / Tb , the starting/finishing temperature of the storage
material, K; Mp, the total thermal capacity of the storage material, J/K; cp,p, the average specific heat
capacity of the storage material, J/(kg K); tc/ td, the charging/discharging time, s; tc,max/ td,max, the total
charging/discharging time, s.
For latent TES, Both of the outlet HTF temperatures in the charging and discharging process equal to
the phase-change temperature. So similar equations can be written as for the solid sensible TES, as shown
in Equations (9)~(11). Thus, the performance of latent TES depends on the non-dimensional melting
temperatureCTp and the charging/discharging mass flow ratio, Crcd.
Tc,o(tc)= Td,o(td)=Tp
(9)
tc,max+td,max=tcyc
(10)
Qeff

t d ,max

md , f c p , f (Td , o  Td , i ) X 1  Tc / Td , o  Te / Tc  Te  dt d

Where, Tp is the melting temperature.

4. Results and discussion

(11)

1980

Xiaoguo Teng and Xin Wang / Energy Procedia 61 (2014) 1977 1981

The results of the sensible TES are showed in Fig. 2. The mass flow of HTF in the charging process is
9.2 kg/s; the average specific heat capacity of HTF, 1.145 kJ/(kg ); the inlet temperature in the
charging/discharging process, 550 / 170 ; the non-dimensional thermal capacity of the storage
material, 1; the charging/discharging mass flow ratio, 1.
When the non-dimensional thermal capacity of the storage material is 0.1, the non-dimensional cooling
capacity decreases as the non-dimensional starting storage material temperature increases. When the nondimensional thermal capacity of the storage material is higher than 1, there exists the optimal nondimensional starting temperature, at which the non-dimensional cooling capacity can achieve the highest.
The non-dimensional cooling capacity increases with the increasing of the non-dimensional thermal
capacity of the storage material. In Fig. 2 (b), the non-dimensional cooling capacity increases as the mass
flow ratio decreases, which indicates the discharging mass flow of HTF should be designed higher than
the charging mass flow. We can also see that the optimal non-dimensional initial storage material
temperature increases as the mass flow ratio increases.

(a)

(b)

Fig.2 (a)The non-dimensional cooling capacity under different thermal capacity and initial temperature in sensible TES; (b) The
non-dimensional cooling capacity under different mass flow ratio and initial temperature in sensible TES

Fig.3 The non-dimensional cooling capacity under different mass flow ratio and phase-change temperature in latent TES

In latent TES, as shown in Fig. 3, the non-dimensional cooling capacity increases and then decreases
with the increase of the phase-change temperature. There exists the optimal phase-change temperature.
The non-dimensional cooling capacity decreases with the increase of the charging/discharging mass flow
ratio. The highest non-dimensional cooling capacity is higher than the solid sensible TES.
5. Conclusions
The solid sensible and latent TES applied in BCHP systems are analyzed theoretically, with the
constraint of limited storage period taken into consideration. The key non-dimensional design parameters

Xiaoguo Teng and Xin Wang / Energy Procedia 61 (2014) 1977 1981

for TES are obtained: the non-dimensional storage material thermal capacity, the starting working
temperature and the mass flow ratio for solid sensible TES; while the non-dimensional phase-change
temperature and the mass flow ratio for latent TES. There exists optimal working temperature range at
which the non-dimensional cooling capacity reaches the highest for those two kinds of TES. For the solid
sensible and latent TES, the discharging mass flow should be higher than charging. In the future work,
limited NTU and limited coefficient of heat conduction should be taken into consideration.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by National Basic Research Program of China (2010CB227305) and
National Natural Science Foundation of China (51376098).
References
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[3] Jordan, U. and S. Furbo, Thermalstratification in smallsolardomesticstoragetankscaused by draw-offs. Solar Energy, 2005,
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[4] A. Campos Celador, M. Odriozola, J. M. Sala, Implications of the modelling of stratified hot water storage tanks in the
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[5] Bjurstrm H, Carlsson B. An exergy analysis of sensible and latent heat stor-age. J Heat Recov Syst 1985, 5(3): 233e 50.
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Biography
Xiaoguo Teng, is a master student in the department of Building Science, School of
Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. She studies on the theoretical analysis
of TES applied in BCHP systems. Email: tengxiaoguo@foxmail.com

1981