Seasonal thermal energy storage

Abstract

Thermal energy in the form of heat or cold can be effectively stored and used to offset the required cooling/heating demand in dwellings using seasonal thermal energy storage (SeTES). As the name indicates, seasonal storage technologies are primarily intended for storing thermal energy during one seasonal condition (summer or winter) and discharging the stored energy in the other seasonal condition, depending on the load demand. SeTES makes use of large basins or earth subsurface as the key source for enabling the energy storage to serve multiple dwellings through a district cooling/heating network. The implementation of SeTES technologies combined with a solar collector facility especially applied to dwelling applications can help achieve a solar fraction value ranging from 20 to 80% on a long-term basis.