Following the ambitious EU plan in cutting the greenhouse emission and replacing conventional heat sources through the presence of renewable energy share inside efficient district heating fields, seasonal storage coupled with district heating plants can have a viable contribution to this goal. However, the performance uncertainty combined with the inadequate assessment regarding the financial potential and the greenhouse emission reduction associated with the deployment of those innovate district heating systems represents a great challenge for sufficiently apply it. Our work tends to explore the prospects for wide-scale deployment of the seasonal storage in the residential sector in the German market. The proposed methodology framework correspondingly based on a multi-objective approach which is applied to optimize the cost against an aggregated environmental metric throughout the life cycle of the proposed system in comparison to their relative conventional heating systems. In this context, the proposed methodology framework is applied to Berlin as a representative for the central European climate zone with consideration for the seasonal and short-term storage systems and their relatively load profiles. The environmental improvement associated with the solar district heating system (SDHS) coupled with seasonal storage in the central European climate zone is heavily weighed enough in decision making for proposing SDHS as a sustainable solution replacing the conventional heat sources. Furthermore, the proposed methodology framework successes in eliminating the yearly system variation. Thus, the yearly solar fraction never goes down below than 97.8% in the investigated climate zone. Overall this study can assist in approving the feasibility of the SDHS with the goal of establishing a more sustainable energy infrastructure in Germany.

Greenhouse gas emission reduction and the consequent decrease in the environmental impacts of fossil fuel can be achieved by cutting back on energy consumption in the building sector that consumes around 30% of total final energy around the globe. The building sector is a complex component of the modern economy and life and includes diverse types of structures, uses, and energy patterns. Such variability is a result of the way that buildings are designed, built, and used in addition to the variations of their materials, equipment, and users. From the start of the construction phase until their demolition, buildings involve energy consumption. A single building’s energy consumption pattern can be called its energy inertia, that is the way it consumes energy throughout its lifetime. Energy consumption also varies according to the age of the buildings. As a building gets older, its structure and equipment start losing their efficiency and often lead to increasing energy consumption over time. At any given time, the building sector is composed of structures of various ages. Some are under construction, others are recently built, some have lived to be mature and some quite old enough to be demolished. This complexity in the building sector creates a momentum against implementation of policies that reduce energy consumption. In this study, a system dynamic model is developed to perceive the temporal evolution of energy consumption and efficiency measures for the villa-type building stock in Qatar. This model tests energy efficiency policy measures such as renovation rates of 15 and 30 years, for buildings that are considered old, and also examines implementation of technology and building codes for new buildings. Results reveal savings of between 157 GWh and 1,275 GWh of electricity and reduction in CO 2 emissions ranging from 77,000 tonnes to 602,000 tonnes.

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is working with industry to independently monitor up to fifteen distinct 5 kilowatt-electric (kWe) combined heat and power (CHP) high temperature (HT) proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell systems (FCSs) installed in light commercial buildings. This research paper discusses an evaluation of the first six months of measured performance data acquired at a one-second sampling rate from real-time monitoring equipment attached to the FCSs at building sites. Engineering performance parameters are independently evaluated. Based on an analysis of the first few months of measured operating data, FCS performance is consistent with manufacturer-stated performance. Initial data indicate that the FCSs have relatively stable performance and a long term average production of about 4.57 kWe of power. This value is consistent with, but slightly below, the manufacturer’s stated rated electric power output of 5 kWe. The measured system net electric efficiency has averaged 33.7%, based on the higher heating value (HHV) of natural gas fuel. This value, also, is consistent with, but slightly below, the manufacturer’s stated rated electric efficiency of 36%. The FCSs provide low-grade hot water to the building at a measured average temperature of about 48.4°C, lower than the manufacturer’s stated maximum hot water delivery temperature of 65°C. The uptime of the systems is also evaluated. System availability can be defined as the quotient of total operating time compared to time since commissioning. The average values for system availability vary between 96.1 and 97.3%, depending on the FCS evaluated in the field. Performance at Rated Value for electrical efficiency (PRV eff ) can be defined as the quotient of the system time operating at or above the rated electric efficiency and the time since commissioning. The PRV eff varies between 5.6% and 31.6%, depending on the FCS field unit evaluated. Performance at Rated Value for electrical power (PRV p ) can be defined as the quotient of the system time operating at or above the rated electric power and the time since commissioning. PRV p varies between 6.5% and 16.2%. Performance at Rated Value for electrical efficiency and power (PRV t ) can be defined as the quotient of the system time operating at or above both the rated electric efficiency and the electric power output compared to the time since commissioning. PRV t varies between 0.2% and 1.4%. Optimization to determine the manufacturer rating required to achieve PRV t greater than 80% has been performed based on the collected data. For example, for FCS unit 130 to achieve a PRV t of 95%, it would have to be down-rated to an electrical power output of 3.2 kWe and an electrical efficiency of 29%.The use of PRV as an assessment metric for FCSs has been developed and reported for the first time in this paper. For FCS Unit 130, a 20% decline in electric power output was observed from approximately 5 kWe to 4 kWe over a 1,500 hour period between Dec. 14th 2011 and Feb. 14th 2012.

Palm oil extraction generates a great amount of biomass residues; i.e. kernel pieces, fiber and fruit bunches. The last is the major quantity, but it has limited usage as an energetic source due to physical-chemical characteristics and high humidity. Biodiesel production requires methanol, which is mainly produced form natural gas in very large industrial plants, oscillating between 700×10 3 to 1400 x10 3 tons per year. This paper presents an economical and technical analysis for production of biometanol from oil palm biomass residues, considering the requirements for the year 2019 in Colombia, which are expected to be 92.5 x10 3 tons. Different technological approximations are considered and the different parts for the selected process are dimensioned, due to the small size of the plant required. The process simulation is carried out using ASPENPLUS™, giving a global efficiency around 48%, and a yield of 43% for the biomass used. The production simulation allows comparing with the international price for methanol, and the cutting point is U$ 152/Ton. This value is compared with the international price of crude oil and it was found that it is only superior when the oil price is under U$ 20. Due to the tendency for oil prices to increase, it is feasible, at least form the economical point of view, to develop a small scale biometanol plant.

This paper deals with the construction and implementation of the Off-Grid Zero Emissions Building (OGZEB), a project undertaken by the Energy Sustainability Center (ESC), formally the Sustainable Energy Science and Engineering Center (SESEC), at the Florida State University (FSU). The project involves the design, construction and operation of a completely solar-powered building that achieves LEED-NC (Leadership in Energy and Environment Design-New Construction) platinum certification. The 1064 square foot building is partitioned such that 800 square feet is a two bedroom, graduate student style flat with the remaining 264 square feet serving as office space. This arrangement allows the building to serve as an energy efficient model for campus designers in student living and office space. The building also serves as a prototype for developing and implementing cutting edge, alternative energy technologies in both residential and commercial settings. For example, hydrogen is used extensively in meeting the energy needs of the OGZEB. In lieu of high efficiency batteries, the excess electricity produced by the buildings photovoltaic (PV) panels is used to generate hydrogen via water electrolysis for long term energy storage. The hydrogen is stored on-site until needed for either generating electricity in a Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cell stack or combusted in natural gas appliances that have been modified for hydrogen use. The use of hydrogen in modified natural gas appliances, such as an on-demand hot water heater and cook top, is unique to the OGZEB. This paper discusses the problems and solutions that arose during construction and includes detailed schematics of the OGZEBs energy system.

This paper deals with the Off-Grid Zero Emissions Building (OGZEB), a project undertaken by the Sustainable Energy Science & Engineering Center (SESEC) at Florida State University (FSU). The project involves the design, construction and operation of a completely solar-powered building that achieves LEED-NC (Leadership in Energy and Environment Design-New Construction) platinum certification. The resulting 1000 square foot building will be partitioned such that 750 square feet will be a two bedroom, graduate student style flat with the remaining 250 square feet serving as office space. This arrangement will allow the building to serve as an energy efficient model for campus designers in student living and office space. The building will also serve as a prototype for developing and implementing cutting edge, alternative energy technologies in both residential and commercial settings. For example, hydrogen will be used extensively in meeting the energy needs of the OGZEB. In lieu of high efficiency batteries, the excess electricity produced by the building’s photovoltaic (PV) panels will be used to generate hydrogen via water electrolysis. The hydrogen will be stored on-site until needed for either generating electricity in a Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cell stack or combusted in natural gas appliances that have been modified for hydrogen use. Although commercial variants already exist, a highly efficient water electrolysis device and innovative PEM fuel cell are currently under development at SESEC and both will be implemented into the OGZEB. The use of hydrogen in modified natural gas appliances, such as an on-demand hot water heater and cook top, is unique to the OGZEB.