Investigation of the Readiness of Ground Soils for the Installation of Ground Heat Exchange Systems in Baghdad City

Salam J Bash Almaliky

doi:10.5539/jgg.v3n1p200

Abstract

This paper was meant to bench mark the possibility of the use of underground soils of Baghdad, Iraq for the installation of Ground Heat Exchange (GHE) systems for heating and cooling purposes in order to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels that were used in conventional plants and the related economic and environmental pollution aspects. Ten thermocouples were installed in each location, at different depths down to 4.5m at AlSadr and AlKry`at cities, north eastern side of Baghdad, in order to record their daily temperature trends at different times for four months; namely January, April, July and October of 2010. The relevant soil thermal properties were tested at different depths to incorporate their possible variations. Both locations had proved high chances to host summer horizontal cooling systems at 3m depths or more, where higher than 20C negative temperature differences were recorded as compared with ground surface temperatures, while positive differences were determined to be around 7C and 10C at 4m depth for AlKry`at and AlSadr cities respectively during winter times, which suggest that they may serve for preheating systems during these times.

Highlights

Heating and cooling systems were considered for long times as of the most important requirements for numerous industrial, commercial and municipal uses for which huge budgets were allocated for their installation, operation and maintenance, and according to the Economist (Nov 25th 2010) the worldwide spending on these systems were estimated to exceed $145 billion a year, this tends to increase with the increase of fuel prices
That and the environmental pollution problems related to the conventional systems; such as the emission of greenhouse gases (Energy Information Administration, US Department of Energy,2007), had led to the worldwide propensity to explore other non-conventional forms of such systems that adopt renewable energy sources
Heating/cooling systems that were based on the Ground Heat Exchange (GHE) were of these options that found various applications in USA, Canada and many European countries since it was first described by Lord Kelvin in 1853 and developed by Peter Ritter von Rittinger in 1855 (International Ground Source Heat Pump Association, 2009)

Summary

Introduction

Heating and cooling systems were considered for long times as of the most important requirements for numerous industrial, commercial and municipal uses for which huge budgets were allocated for their installation, operation and maintenance, and according to the Economist (Nov 25th 2010) the worldwide spending on these systems were estimated to exceed $145 billion a year, this tends to increase with the increase of fuel prices.

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Results

Conclusion