Hydronic system control for heating and cooling
AssigneeCarrier Corporation
InventorWalter E. Bujak, Jr.
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A control system for controlling delivery of either heated or cooled water over a common water line to a plurality of heat exchangers. The control system includes a hydronic system controller which polls the heating or cooling demands of zone controllers controlling the respective delivery of water to the individual heat exchangers. The hydronic system controller is operative to implement a changeover between delivery of heated water to delivery cooled water or vice versa. The implemented changeover preferably includes checking the temperature of the water being returned to the source or sources for heating or cooling the water as well as defining a changeover time period which must occur in the event that the temperature of the water in the return line is not within a predefined range.
Claims15
A control system for controlling a hydronic system having both a heating source capable of heating water to be delivered over a piping line to a plurality of heat exchangers and a cooling source capable of cooling water to be delivered over the same piping line to the plurality of heat exchangers, said control system comprising:
- a plurality of zone controllers, each zone controller connected to a respective heat exchanger so as to control the delivery of water over the piping line to the respective heat exchanger, each zone controller being operative to generate a demand signal corresponding to a request for one of heated water, cooled water or no water;
- a hydronic temperature sensor disposed in the piping line and configured to generate a sensed water temperature;
- and
- a hydronic system controller in communication with each of said zone controllers and operatively coupled to the hydronic temperature sensor, said hydronic system controller being operative to periodically receive the demand signal from each zone controller determine whether a predominance of the demand signals are requests for heating or cooling, and to activate, only if the sensed water temperature of the circulating water is within a predefined temperature range, either the heating source when a predominance of demand signals are for heating or the cooling source when the predominance of demand signals are for cooling.
A hydronic system for use in a space having multiple zones, the hydronic system comprising:
- a heat exchanger disposed in at least three of the zones;
- a heating source capable of heating water;
- a cooling source capable of cooling water;
- a piping line fluidly communicating between both the heating source and the cooling source and each of the heat exchangers;
- a zone controller operatively coupled to each heat exchanger, each zone controller being operable to generate a demand signal in response to at least one sensed parameter in the zone associated with the zone controller, wherein the demand signal corresponds to a request for one of heated water, cooled water, or no water;
- a hydronic temperature sensor disposed in the piping line and configured to generate a sensed water temperature;
- and
- a hydronic system controller operatively coupled to each zone controller and the hydronic temperature sensor, the hydronic system controller being operative to:
- periodically receive the demand signal from each zone controller,
- determine whether a predominance of the demand signals are requests for heating or cooling, and
- activate, only if the sensed water temperature is within a predefined temperature range, either the heating source when the predominance of the demand signals are for heating or the cooling source when the predominance of the demand signals are for cooling.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.