Abstract
During the last years, special attention has been paid to renewable polygeneration technologies, able of simultaneously producing thermal, cooling, electrical energy and desalinated water from seawater. This paper focuses on an innovative polygeneration system driven by renewable energy sources, including the following technologies: hybrid photovoltaic/thermal collectors, concentrating parabolic trough (CPVT), a biomass heater, a single-stage absorption chiller and a multiple-effect distillation desalination system. The system is designed to cover the base load of an isolated small community. In previous papers, the dynamic simulation model about plant operation is discussed. In this paper, a detailed exergy, economic and environmental analysis of the plant is presented. In addition, the plant was optimized using different objective functions, applying the Design of Experiment (DoE) methodology which evaluates the sensitivity of the different objective functions with respect to the selected design parameters. The results show that an increase of the storage volume is generally negative, whereas increasing the solar field area involves an increase of the exergy destruction rate, but also an improvement of the CPVT exergy output provided; the final result is an increase of both the exergy efficiency and the economic profitability of the polygeneration system.
Highlights
During the last few years, worldwide energy consumption has increased rapidly, basically due to the dramatic growth of emerging countries
The following technologies are simultaneously included in the system: solar heating and cooling (SHC), concentrating photovoltaic-thermal collectors (CPVT) and multiple-effect distillation (MED) for seawater desalination
As discussed in reference [21], the system is assumed to be used as a retrofit/repowering of an existing and larger Heating and Cooling system
Summary
During the last few years, worldwide energy consumption has increased rapidly, basically due to the dramatic growth of emerging countries. In the last decade, the fossil fuel cost has been rapidly increasing and the capital cost of renewable technologies has been simultaneously and dramatically decreasing. The consumption of fresh water is increasing dramatically, so that several scientists consider such a resource crucial for the future, even more so than energy. A more sustainable energy supply scheme should be considered in order to achieve a sustainable and environmental friendly worldwide development [1]. In this framework, renewable energies are considered one of the most promising technologies. The following technologies are simultaneously included in the system: solar heating and cooling (SHC), concentrating photovoltaic-thermal collectors (CPVT) and multiple-effect distillation (MED) for seawater desalination
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