Cold climate heat pump system with energy storage
AssigneeTrane International Inc.
InventorsLee R. Cline, Richard M. Heiden, Brian J. Fiegen
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A heat pump system for a building can include thermal energy storage tanks, a first air source heat pump for providing energy to the system, a second air source heat pump for providing energy to the system under cold climate conditions, and an additional heat source for supporting defrost operations and/or to provide energy under extreme cold conditions. The system can further include a controller configured to provide efficient use of energy sources to meet heating demands under extreme cold conditions.
Claims20
A heat pump system, comprising:
- a storage source energy transfer circuit comprising one or more thermal energy storage tanks, the storage source energy transfer circuit configured to circulate a process fluid;
- a heating distribution circuit configured to circulate a heating fluid to a heating load such that the heating fluid provides heating at the heating load when in an operational mode including heating;
- a cooling distribution circuit configured to circulate a fluid to a cooling load such that said fluid provides cooling at the cooling load when in an operational mode including cooling;
- one or more chiller-heaters each configured to transfer heat from the process fluid to the heating fluid so as to heat the heating fluid and cool the process fluid;
- and
- an air source heat pump circuit including an air source heat pump configured to transfer heat from an ambient environment to the process fluid.
A method of charging thermal storage in a storage source heat pump system further including a first air source heat pump, comprising:
- obtaining, at a controller, ambient conditions;
- obtaining, at the controller, a cost and/or carbon intensity of energy;
- determining, using the controller, a cost of adding or removing heat from the thermal storage of the heat pump system based on the ambient conditions, the cost and/or carbon intensity of energy, and performance characteristics of the heat pump system;
- determining, based on the cost and/or carbon intensity of adding heat to the thermal storage, whether to add or remove heat from the thermal storage;
- when it is determined to add or remove heat to the thermal storage, operating the heat pump system so as to add or remove the heat from the thermal storage.
A method of defrosting an air source heat pump of a storage source heat pump system, comprising operating a boiler so as to temper a process fluid temperature of the storage source heat pump system during a defrost operation of said air source heat pump, wherein the boiler is in parallel with the air source heat pump with respect to flow of a process fluid of the storage source heat pump system.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.