Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708

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Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene

Design and performance of the solar-powered floor heating system

in a green building
X.Q. Zhai a, *, J.R. Yang b, R.Z. Wang a
a
Institute of Refrigeration and Cryogenics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200240, China
b
Shanghai Research Institute of Building Science, Shanghai 200031, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In the green building of Shanghai Research Institute of Building Science, the evacuated tubular solar
Received 5 January 2008 collectors with a total area of 150 m2 were installed to provide heating for the covered area of 460 m2.
Accepted 10 November 2008 The floor heating coil pipes were made of high-quality pure copper with the dimension of F
Available online 10 February 2009
12  0.7 mm. Under typical weather condition of Shanghai, the average heating capacity was 25.04 kW
during the working hours from 9:00 to 17:00, which was sufficient to keep indoor thermal environment.
Keywords:
The average electric COP of the floor heating system was 19.76 during the system operation. Compared
Solar energy
with the widely used air-source heat pump heating systems with the electric COP of 3.5 in Shanghai, the
Floor heating system
Experimental investigation solar-powered floor heating system shows great potential in energy conservation in winter. With respect
Performance analysis to the whole heating period, the solar fraction was 56%. According to the performance analysis of the
system with ambient parameters, it was observed that the system performance could be greatly
enhanced with the increase of daily solar insolation. However, the system performance varied slightly
with average ambient temperature. Compared with average ambient temperature, daily solar insolation
had a more distinct influence on the performance of the solar-powered floor heating system.
Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction radiant heating and non-uniform solar radiation incident on it. It

Floor heating systems are becoming increasingly popular due to
the fact that they may provide a more comfortable indoor thermal
environment than convective heating systems. Furthermore, the
floor heating systems provide a good compromise between energy
consumption and thermal comfort [1].
Some papers concerning numerical analysis of floor heating
systems have been reported. Alkhalaileh et al. presented a one-
dimensional numerical model, which was used to simulate and
analyze the performance of a solar pond floor heating system [2].
Ho et al. developed a two-dimensional numerical model for
a hydronic heating panel, which was capable of predicting both
steady state temperature profiles and transient responses [3].
Weitzmann et al. presented a two-dimensional dynamic simulation
model for the heat loss and temperature distribution in a slab-on-
grade floor with floor heating. The model could be used to design
energy efficient houses with floor heating, focusing on the heat loss
through the floor construction and foundation [4]. Athienitis and
Chen employed a three-dimensional explicit finite differential
model to determine the temperature distribution for a floor with
* Corresponding author. Tel./fax: þ86 21 34206296.
E-mail address: xqzhai@sjtu.edu.cn (X.Q. Zhai).
was shown that the solar energy absorption by the thermal mass of
a floor heating system might contribute to a significant reduction in
energy consumption [5]. Golebiowski and Kwieckowski investi-
gated the dynamics of the three-dimensional temperature field in
the system with a direct floor heater, and analyzed the transient
temperature distribution [6].
With regard to the heat sources of floor heating systems,
Hamada et al. described a floor heating system driven by a ground
source heat pump. It was shown that the COP of the system was 4.0.
The primary energy reduction rate relative to a conventional boiler
heating system was 34% [7]. Sakellari and Lundqvist made use of
the computational tools TRANSYS and EES to model and analyze the
performance of a residential house. The ventilation system and the
floor heating system of this house were based on an exhaust air
heat pump [8]. Yeo et al. reported that two types of heating
production and supply systems were generally used for the hot
water floor heating systems in Korea. One was the central system
that supplied hot water from a central boiler or a district heating
plant, covering multiple block of apartment housing. The other was
the individual system using a gas-fired boiler installed in each
housing unit [9].
Generally, the supply water temperature of floor heating
systems is relatively lower, which leads to the feasibility of

0960-1481/$ – see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.renene.2008.11.027
 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708
Nomenclature
A area (m2)
COP system efficiency
Cp specific heat of water (J/kg  C)
D1 duration of the solar collecting system operation (s)
D2 duration of the floor heating system operation (s)
D3 duration of sunshine (s)
FCi collector control function
FLi load return control function
I solar radiant intensity (W/m)
m mass flow rate (kg/s)
N number of nodes
Q heat quantity (kW)
T temperature ( C)
U heat loss coefficient (W/m2  C)
Greek symbols
r density (kg/m3)
h solar collecting efficiency
Dm net flow between nodes (kg/s)
low-grade heat sources. Solar-powered floor heating systems have
been regarded as appropriate choices in solar thermal utilization
projects because solar energy is characteristic of low density of heat
flow rate. Besides, it is difficult for the ordinary solar collectors on
the market to attain high working temperature.
Kuang and Wang reported the experimental results of a floor
heating system driven by a direct-expansion solar assisted heat
pump (DX-SAHP) system. The daily-averaged heat pump COP
varied from 2.6 to 3.3, while the system COP ranged from 2.1 to 2.7
[10]. Argiriou et al. used TRANSYS to simulate a floor heating system
driven by a solar assisted absorption heat pump (AHP). The esti-
mated energy savings against a conventional heating installation
using a compression type heat pump was in the range of 20–27%
[11]. Alkhalaileh et al. presented a solar pond floor heating system.
A developed computer simulation was utilized to study the
potential of using such a system under the climate conditions of
Jordan. It was found that the solar pond heating system could meet
most of the winter season in Jordan with the solar fraction in the
range of 80–100% for at least 2 months of the season [2]. Badran and
Hamdan carried out theoretical and experimental investigations for
two types of floor heating system powered by a solar collector array
and a solar pond, respectively. It was concluded that the solar
collector system was 7% more efficient than the solar pond system.
Economic analysis showed that the solar collector system would
break even earlier than the solar pond system. Practical consider-
ations showed that the solar collector system required less
operation and maintenance work [12]. Martı́nez et al. reported
a solar-powered floor heating system with a heat pump as the
auxiliary heat source. Under the weather condition of Murcia
(Spain), the solar fractions registered during the months of January
and February at the system were 0.428 and 0.342, respectively [13].
Among the aforementioned investigations, few reports have
been concerned with detailed experimental study of solar-powered
floor heating systems. In this paper, a solar-powered floor heating
system was designed. The operation characteristics under typical
weather condition of Shanghai were analyzed. Besides, the system
performance was analyzed based on ambient parameters. The
research work of this paper was done in Shanghai. However, it is
contributive to the design and operation of solar-powered floor
heating systems in other areas. The design method and the control
strategy introduced in this paper were instructional for the design
1701
Dx distance between nodes (m)
Subscripts
a ambient
air indoor air
ave average
c solar collector
fl floor
h heating
hp heat pipe evacuated tubular solar collector
hw hot water
i node
nh non-heating
o outlet
se section
si side
solar solar
ta tank
U U-type evacuated tubular solar collector
w water
of solar-powered floor heating systems. The experimental investi-
gation indicated typical operating characteristics of the solar-
powered floor heating system. Besides, the potential of energy
conservation for such a system was evident through the analysis of
system efficiency (COP).
2. Design of the solar-powered floor heating system
2.1. Integration of solar collectors on the green building
Two solar collector types with a total area of 150 m2 were
installed on the roof of the green building of Shanghai Research
Institute of Building Science. The solar collectors acted as the
thermal source for the solar-powered floor heating system. The
90 m2 U-type evacuated tubular solar collectors with CPC were
placed on the west side, and the other 60 m2 heat pipe evacuated
tubular solar collectors on the east side. The two solar collector
arrays were connected in parallel. The roof structure of the building
was made of steel, and had been designed to face south, tilted at 40
to the horizontal ground surface. The solar collectors were moun-
ted and integrated with the building perfectly as shown in Fig. 1.
2.2. Design of the solar-powered floor heating system
The system design was based on the heating load calculation
results of Shanghai Research Institute of Building Science. The
heating load of the involved area (460 m2) was 25 kW. Except for
solar collectors, the system mainly consisted of floor heating coil
pipes and circulating pumps. Besides, a heat storage water tank of
2.5 m3 in volume was employed to collect solar heat, thereby
providing hot water for the solar-powered floor heating system.
The flow diagram of the solar-powered floor heating system is
shown in Fig. 2, where Pump 1 and Pump 2 are for the solar col-
lecting loop and floor heating loop, respectively.
In this project, the cuprotherm floor heating system produced
by Wieland Ltd. of Shanghai was chosen. Fig. 3 shows the
arrangement of floor heating coil pipes. The floor heating coil pipes
were made of high-quality pure copper with the dimension of F
12  0.7 mm. They were fixed on the 30 mm thick polystyrene
insulation layer with spacing interval of 200 mm. And then the
crushed stone concrete was poured with the thickness of 70 mm.
1702 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708

Fig. 1. Appearance of the green building integrated with solar collectors.

2.3. Data acquisition and control system
The temperatures were recorded by platinum resistance ther-
mometers (Pt1000, grade A), which were fixed at main points of the
system either for inspection or for control. As shown in Fig. 2, for
each solar collector array, two thermometers (T1 and T2) were used
to measure the outlet and inlet temperatures, respectively. For the
floor heating loop, two other thermometers (T4 and T3) were used
to measure the outlet and inlet temperatures, respectively. In
addition, three thermometers were fixed at the top (T7), middle
(T6) and bottom (T5) of the heat storage water tank, respectively.
Two remote transmitting flowmeters (3% accuracy in the range of
0–15 m3/h) were used to measure the water flow rate for the solar
collecting loop and the floor heating loop, respectively. The inso-
lation was measured by a pyranometer with 2% of accuracy. The
data were recorded at every 15 s interval in a data logger, which
was connected to a computer.
The system could be operated automatically via a control
panel. The solar collecting pump (Pump 1) was controlled by the
temperature difference between the solar collector arrays (T1)
and the heat storage water tank (T5). The solar collecting pump
started to operate when sufficient insolation was available and
the temperature difference reached 5  C. However, when the
temperature difference was lower than 2  C, the solar collecting
pump stopped. The floor heating pump (Pump 2) was controlled
by the thermometer T7. When the heat storage water tank was
heated to the set value (35  C), the floor heating pump was
switched on to circulate hot water between the heat storage
water tank and the floor heating coil pipes underneath the floor
surface until the temperature of hot water in the tank decreased

Thermometer Overflowing pipe

T1 Flow meter
Pump 2
M T3
T7
T2 Heat storage
T6 water tank Water distributor
Pump 1
M

T4
T5
Water replenishing
Solar collector arrays
Water collector
Drainage pipe

Control panel

Floor heating coil pipes

Fig. 2. Flow diagram of the solar-powered floor heating system.

 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708 1703

from the heat storage water tank would recirculate in the solar
a collecting loop to protect the collectors and the piping loop from
damage.

3. Mathematical modeling

3.1. Heat storage water tank

The heat storage water tank could be considered as a strati-

fied water tank and could be modeled by dividing the tank into
N nodes (sections), with energy balances written for each
section of the tank. The energy equation took into account the
energy gain from the solar collectors, energy lost to surround-
ings and energy consumed by the floor heating system. The
result was a set of N differential equations that could be solved
for the temperatures of the N nodes as a function of time [14].
The simulation model of the heat storage water tank is shown in
Fig. 4.
FCi is a collector control function, which can be defined to
b Ground tile
Sand-cement grout
identify which node receives water from the collectors. FLi is a load
return control function, which can be denoted to identify which
Concrete layer
node receives water returning from the floor heating system.
Protective layer
Insulation layer 8
Damp proof course < 1; if i ¼ 1 and Tc;o  Tta;i
Copper pipe Floor FiC ¼ 1; if Tta;i1  Tc;o > Tta;i (1)
:
0; otherwise

8
70

< 1; if i ¼ N and Thw;o  Tta;N

FiL ¼ 1; if Tta;i  Thw;o > Tta;iþ1 (2)
:
0; otherwise
30

The net flow between nodes can be either towards the top or the
bottom of the tank, depending on the magnitudes of the collectors’
flow mc and the hot water flow to the floor heating system mhw, and
Fig. 3. Arrangement of floor heating coil pipes. (a) Photo of the floor heating coil pipes.
(b) Arrangement of floor heating coil pipe integrated with floor. the values of the two control functions at any particular instant. It is
given as:
8 P
below 30  C. Nevertheless, after 19:00, the floor heating system >
> mhw N L
j ¼ 2 Fj ; if i ¼ 1
< Pi1 C P
would be switched off even when the water temperature in the Dmi ¼ mc j ¼ 1 Fj  mhw Nj¼ iþ1 FjL ; if i ¼ 2; .; N  1
>
> P
tank was higher than 30  C. Besides, if the outlet temperature of :m N1 C
F ; if i ¼ N
c j¼1 j
any one solar collector array was lower than 4  C, the solar col-
lecting pump would operate for 10 min, and then the hot water (3)

Losses To floor heating system

From collectors m hw
mc T ta,1 at T ta,1
at T c,o F 1Cm c F 1Lm hw

F 1Cm c ( F 2L + ...+ F LN ) m hw
...

( F C1 + ...+ F Ci-1 ) m c ( F iL + ...+ F LN ) m hw

Losses
T ta,i
F Ci m c F iLm hw
( F C1 + ...+ F Ci ) m c ( F i+1
L
+ ...+ F LN ) m hw
...

( F C1 + ...+ F N-1
C )
mc F NL m hw
Losses
From floor heating system
To collectors T ta, N m hw
mc F NC m c F NL m hw at T hw, o
at T ta, N

Fig. 4. Simulation model of heat storage water tank.

1704 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708

Fig. 5. Variations of ambient temperature and solar radiant intensity.

Then, the energy balance on each node can be expressed as:

 
dTta;i Uta Ata;si    
rw;i Ata;se Dx ¼ Ta  Tta;i þ FiC mc Tc;o  Tta;i
dt Cp;w i
 
þ FiL mhw Thw;o  Tta;i
  
Dmi Tta;i1
  Tta;i if Dmi > 0
þ
Dmiþ1 Tta;i  Tta;iþ1 if Dmi < 0
(4)

3.2. Solar collectors

The useful energy received by the solar collectors can be

calculated according to instantaneous efficiency of two solar
collector arrays.
Based on the experimental results, for the heat pipe evacuated
tubular solar collector array, the instantaneous efficiency was
obtained by:
Fig. 6. Variations of inlet and outlet water temperatures of the solar collector arrays.
  (a) U-type pipe evacuated tubular solar collector array. (b) Heat pipe evacuated tubular
hhp ¼ 0:65  2:94 Tta;N  Ta =I (5)
solar collector array.
and for the U-type evacuated tubular solar collector array by:
 
hU ¼ 0:45  1:10 Tta;N  Ta =I (6)

3.3. Floor heating system

The floor heating model was based on one-dimensional heat

transfer concepts for internal flow in pipes as well as heat transfer
through a horizontal plate heated from its lower surface. See
Alkhalaileh et al. [2] for a detailed account of the model. The
heating capacity was calculated by:
 
Qh ¼ Cp;w mhw Tta;1  Thw;o (7)

Based on the above mathematical models and thermal process

analysis of the green building, a simulation software for this project
was developed [15]. It was testified to be valid for the theoretical
analysis of the solar-powered floor heating system in the green
building.

3.4. Daily average performance indexes

In the performance analysis, the daily average solar collecting

efficiency during the system operation was calculated by: Fig. 7. Variation of solar collecting heat by two solar collector arrays.
 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708 1705

Fig. 8. Variations of the temperatures inside heat storage water tank during operation Fig. 10. Variation of heating capacity during the system operation.
of the floor heating system.

4. Experimental investigation
R R
Ahp hhp I dt þ AU hU I dt
D1 D1 4.1. Experimental investigation under typical weather condition
have ¼ R   (8)
Ahp þ AU I dt
D3 Experimental results under typical weather condition of
The daily average supply water temperature of the floor heating Shanghai were chosen to analyze the performance of the solar-
system was expressed as: powered floor heating system. Fig. 5 shows the variations of
ambient temperature and solar radiant intensity during the oper-
R
Tta;1 dt ating hours. The daily solar insolation was 18 MJ/m2 and average
D2 ambient temperature was 1.98  C.
Thw;ave ¼ (9)
D2 Fig. 6 shows the variations of inlet and outlet water temperature
The daily average heating capacity was calculated by: for the U-type evacuated tubular solar collector array and heat pipe
solar collector array, respectively, where point 1 represents the
R
Qh dt solar collecting circulation for protection of frost at night, point 2
Qh;ave ¼ D2
(10) represents the automatic start of the solar collecting circulation in
D2 the daytime, and point 3 represents the automatic stop of the solar
The daily average solar COP was expressed as: collecting circulation. Fig. 7 shows the variation of solar collecting
heat by two solar collector arrays. It was observed that the solar
R
Qh dt collecting heat varied in accord with the variation of solar radiant
COPsolar ¼  D2
 R (11) intensity. From Fig. 5, it was observed that the solar radiant
Ahp þ AU I dt intensity fluctuated in the morning. However, in the simulation, the
D3

Fig. 9. Variations of supply water and back water temperature during the system Fig. 11. Variations of floor temperature and indoor air temperature in the floor heating
operation. room and the non-heating room.
1706 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708

Table 1
Summarization of solar-powered floor heating experiments.

Month/year Average ambient Daily solar Solar collecting Heating capacity Floor temperature Indoor air Solar COP
temperature insolation efficiency temperature
(mm/yy) ( C) (MJ/m2) (%) (kW) ( C) ( C)
12/2004 12.12 13.04 39.5 22.7 23.43 17.63 0.40
01/2005 3.39 14.41 40.6 24.6 20.91 13.19 0.41
02/2005 2.97 15.76 38.7 26.3 22.83 14.14 0.39
03/2005 8.26 16.68 41.0 27.8 24.02 16.69 0.41

data of solar radiant intensity and ambient temperature were input the floor heating room reached 23.71  C, which was higher than
as continuous functions, which were obtained by the curve fitting that of the non-heating room by 16.10  C. It was also observed that
method according to the experimental data. Consequently, the the average indoor air temperature of the floor heating room was
divergence between experimental data and simulation results 17.10  C, which was higher than that of the non-heating room by
could be observed in the morning. Based on the experimental 9.16  C.
results, the daily average solar collecting efficiency for the heat pipe As for the solar-powered floor heating system, electric COP is
solar collector array was 37.44%, and 35.56% for the U-type evacu- another important index to evaluate the performance of the
ated tubular solar collector array. The overall solar collecting heat system. In this system, taking the solar collecting pump (Pump 1)
for the two solar collector arrays was 971.39 MJ/day, and the cor- and the floor heating pump (Pump 2) into account, the whole
responding daily average solar collecting efficiency was 36.29%. power consumption was 1.1 kW, and then the electric COP averaged
The heat storage water tank was specially designed to be the at 19.76 during the system operation. Compared with the widely
link between the solar collecting loop and the floor heating loop. used air-source heat pump heating systems with the electric COP of
The hot water from the solar collector arrays flowed into the top of 3.5 in Shanghai, the solar-powered floor heating system shows
the water tank, and the water returning from the floor heating great potential in energy conservation in winter.
system flowed to the bottom. In addition, the hot water for the floor
heating system came from the top of the water tank. Fig. 8 shows
the variations of temperatures inside the heat storage water tank
during the operation of the floor heating system, where point 4 and
point 5 represent the start and the stop of the floor heating pump,
respectively. It was observed that the water temperature inside the
heat storage water tank decreased by about 8  C after the solar
collecting circulation for protection of frost. It was also observed
that the temperature of the middle approached that of the top. The
daily average temperature of the top was higher than that of the
bottom by 1.0  C. Such thermal stratification could be enhanced if
the partitioned water tank were adopted, which has been studied
by Li and Sumathy [14].
Fig. 9 shows the variations of supply and back water tempera-
ture of the floor heating loop during the system operation. It was
observed that the solar-powered floor heating system continuously
operated for about 12 h with the average supply and back water
temperature of 51.17  C and 44.68  C, respectively. It was also
observed that, initially, both the supply water temperature and the
back water temperature increased, and then decreased, which was
in accord with the variation of solar insolation. Correspondingly,
the heating capacity had a similar trend as shown in Fig. 10. The
average heating capacity was 21.74 kW during the system opera-
tion. During the working hours from 9:00 to 17:00, the average
heating capacity attained 25.04 kW, which was sufficient to keep
indoor thermal environment. With regard to the daily solar inso-
lation, the daily average solar COP of the system was 0.36. Fig. 11
shows the variations of the floor temperatures and indoor air
temperatures in the floor heating room and the non-heating room.
Here, Ta represents the ambient temperature, Tfl,h and Tair,h repre-
sent the floor temperature and indoor air temperature of the
heating room, respectively, besides, Tfl,nh and Tair,nh denote the floor
temperature and indoor air temperature of the non-heating room,
respectively. It was observed that the average floor temperature of

Table 2
Some basic parameters for calculation.
Fig. 12. Variations of system performance with daily solar insolation. (a) Daily average
Ahp Ata,se Ata,si AU mc mhw Uta solar collecting efficiency, heating capacity and solar COP versus daily solar insolation.
60 1.77 6.12 90 1.6 1.3 0.15 (b) Daily average supply temperature, floor temperature and indoor air temperature
versus daily solar insolation.
 X.Q. Zhai et al. / Renewable Energy 34 (2009) 1700–1708
Fig. 13. Variations of system performance with average ambient temperature. (a) Daily
average solar collecting efficiency, heating capacity and solar COP versus average
ambient temperature. (b) Daily average supply temperature, floor temperature and
indoor air temperature versus average ambient temperature.
4.2. Summary of the system in winter
The solar-powered floor heating system had been in operation
in sunny days and cloudy days from Dec. 1st 2004 to Mar. 13th
2005. In rainy days, the floor heating system was powered by
a gas-fired boiler. With respect to the whole heating period, the
floor heating system was capable of meeting the heating
requirements in 58 days. Experimental results based on these 58
days are listed in Table 1. The solar fraction for the system in
winter was 56%.
5. Performance analysis of the system with ambient
parameters
Variations of the system performance with ambient parameters
(daily solar insolation and average ambient temperature) were
analyzed. Both the solar radiant intensity and the ambient
temperature were assumed to keep the same trend as Fig. 5,
however, the values varied proportionally. Some basic parameters
used in the calculations are listed in Table 2.
Fig. 12 shows the variations of the system performance with
daily solar insolation when the average ambient temperature was
2  C. It was observed that the daily average solar collecting effi-
ciency increased with the increase of daily solar insolation, which
1707
led to an augmentation of solar collecting heat in the heat storage
water tank. As a consequence, the daily average supply water
temperature and the daily average heating capacity increased with
the increase of daily solar insolation. Under the identical heating
load, both the average floor temperature and average indoor air
temperature during the working hours would accordingly go up
because of the increment of heating capacity. It was also observed
that the solar COP decreased with the increase of daily solar inso-
lation. Such a phenomenon could be due to the fact that, except the
heat supplied to the floor heating system, more solar collecting heat
was stored in the water tank with the increase of daily solar
insolation.
Fig. 13 shows the variations of the system performance with
average ambient temperature when the daily solar insolation was
18 MJ/m2. It was observed that the daily average solar collecting
efficiency increased slightly with the increase in ambient temper-
ature, correspondingly, both the daily average heating capacity and
solar COP moved up slightly. Therefore, according to Figs. 12 and 13,
it was found that, compared with ambient temperature, solar
radiant intensity had a more distinct influence on the performance
of the solar-powered floor heating system. It was also found that
only an inconspicuous increase could be seen for the daily average
supply water temperature. Comparatively, both the average floor
temperature and average indoor air temperature during the
working hours went up apparently owing to (a) increment of
heating capacity; (b) decrease of heating load with the increase of
ambient temperature.
6. Conclusions
A solar-powered floor heating system was designed and con-
structed in the green building of Shanghai Research Institute of
Building Science. The system had continuously run in the whole
winter. As a brief summary, it was wished to emphasize the
significant points of this work in the following.
(1) From our experience, the ratio of evacuated tubular solar
collector area to heating area was about 1:3 under the weather
condition of Shanghai.
(2) Under typical weather condition of Shanghai, the solar-pow-
ered floor heating system was capable of satisfying indoor
thermal environment. The average heating capacity was
25.04 kW during the working hours from 9:00 to 17:00. The
average electric COP of the floor heating system was 19.76
during the system operation.
(3) With respect to the whole heating period, the solar fraction of
the floor heating system was 56%.
(4) Higher the daily solar insolation, better the performance of the
system, similar trend could be seen for ambient temperature. It
was also observed that daily solar insolation had a more
distinct influence on the performance of solar-powered floor
heating system than the ambient temperature.
Acknowledgements
This work is supported by Natural Science Foundation of China
under the contract No. 50876064.
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