• Proceedings of the SAREK Conference
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.45-51
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• 2009

A ground-loop heat exchanger in a ground source heat pump system is an important unit that determines the thermal performance of a system and its initial cost. The size and performance of this heat exchanger is highly dependent on ground thermal properties. A proper design requires certain site-specific parameters, most importantly the ground effective thermal conductivity, the borehole thermal resistance and the undisturbed ground temperature. This study was performed to investigate the effect of some parameters such as borehole lengths, various grouting materials and U-tube configurations on ground effective thermal conductivity. In this study, thermal response tests were conducted using a testing device with 9-different ground-loop heat exchangers. From the experimental results, the length of ground-loop heat exchanger affects to the effective thermal conductivity. Among the various grouting materials, the bentonite-based grout with silica sand shows the largest thermal conductivity value.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.21 no.12
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• pp.715-732
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• 2009

This article reviews the papers published in the Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering during 2008. It is intended to understand the status of current research in the areas of heating, cooling, ventilation, sanitation, and indoor environments of buildings and plant facilities. Conclusions are as follows. (1) Research trends in thermal and fluid engineering have been surveyed in the categories of general fluid flow, fluid machinery and piping, new and renewable energy, and fire. Well-developed CFD technologies were widely applied in developing facilities and their systems. New research topics include fire, fuel cell, and solar energy. Research was mainly focused on flow distribution and optimization in the fields of fluid machinery and piping. Topics related to the development of fans and compressors had been popular, but were no longer investigated widely. Research papers on micro heat exchangers using nanofluids and micro pumps were also not presented during this period. There were some studies on thermal reliability and performance in the fields of new and renewable energy. Numerical simulations of smoke ventilation and the spread of fire were the main topics in the field of fire. (2) Research works on heat transfer presented in 2008 have been reviewed in the categories of heat transfer characteristics, industrial heat exchangers, and ground heat exchangers. Research on heat transfer characteristics included thermal transport in cryogenic vessels, dish solar collectors, radiative thermal reflectors, variable conductance heat pipes, and flow condensation and evaporation of refrigerants. In the area of industrial heat exchangers, examined are research on micro-channel plate heat exchangers, liquid cooled cold plates, fin-tube heat exchangers, and frost behavior of heat exchanger fins. Measurements on ground thermal conductivity and on the thermal diffusion characteristics of ground heat exchangers were reported. (3) In the field of refrigeration, many studies were presented on simultaneous heating and cooling heat pump systems. Switching between various operation modes and optimizing the refrigerant charge were considered in this research. Studies of heat pump systems using unutilized energy sources such as sewage water and river water were reported. Evaporative cooling was studied both theoretically and experimentally as a potential alternative to the conventional methods. (4) Research papers on building facilities have been reviewed and divided into studies on heat and cold sources, air conditioning and air cleaning, ventilation, automatic control of heat sources with piping systems, and sound reduction in hydraulic turbine dynamo rooms. In particular, considered were efficient and effective uses of energy resulting in reduced environmental pollution and operating costs. (5) In the field of building environments, many studies focused on health and comfort. Ventilation. system performance was considered to be important in improving indoor air conditions. Due to high oil prices, various tests were planned to examine building energy consumption and to cut life cycle costs.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.2393-2400
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• 2013

This research presents an experimental study of heat exchange rate of U, W, 2U and coil type ground heat exchangers (GHEs) measured by thermal performance tests (TPTs). The four types of GHEs were installed in a partially saturated dredged soil deposit of Incheon International Airport area. Thermal response tests (TRTs) were conducted for U, W and 2U type GHEs to deduce the ground thermal conductivity. Besides, TPTs were also conducted for U, W, 2U and coil type GHEs to evaluate heat exchanger rates under 100-hr continuous and 8-hr intermittent operation conditions for five days. Coil shaped GHE showed about twice higher thermal performance than the others GHEs. Furthermore, intermittent operation condition showed 30~40% higher heat exchange rates than continuous operation condition.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.263-268
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• 2014

Eskilson's g-function, a well-known geothermal heat response factor, is widely used for sizing of the ground heat exchangers. Unlike the Eskilson's original model that uses common temperature boundaries for all boreholes and along the borehole height, an analytical-solution-based g-function uses a uniform heat transfer rate over the height with variable heat transfer rates for respective boreholes. To evaluate the impact of such a boundary difference on g-function and the design length, a simple case study was carried out on the cooling-dominant commercial buildings. The results show that the design lengths given by the boundary of uniform heat transfer rates are longer than those given by Eskilson's boundary for all cases tested. The difference in length is more important when the bore field is composed of more boreholes with shorter length of each borehole.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.95-102
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• 2011

A ground loop heat exchanger in a ground source heat pump system is an important unit that determines the thermal performance of a system and its initial cost. A proper design requires certain site specific parameters, most importantly the ground effective thermal conductivity, the borehole thermal resistance and the undisturbed ground temperature. This study was performed to investigate the effect of some parameters such as borehole lengths, various grouting materials and U tube configurations on ground effective thermal conductivity and borehole thermal resistance. In this study, thermal response tests were conducted using a testing device to 9 different ground loop heat exchangers. From the experimental results, the length of ground loop heat exchanger affects to the effective thermal conductivity. The results of this experiment shows that higher thermal conductivity of grouting materials leads to the increase effective thermal conductivity from 22 to 32%. Also, mounting spacers have increased by 14%.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.297-302
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• 2013

The ground source heat pump (GSHP) system has attracted attention, because of its stability of heat production, and the high efficiency of the system. However, there are few studies on the prediction method of the heat exchange rate for a horizontal GSHP system. In this research, in order to predict the performance of a horizontal GSHP system, coupled simulation with a ground heat transfer model and a heat exchanger circulation model was developed, and calculation of heat exchange rate was conducted by the developed tool. In order to optimally design the horizontal GSHP system, the flow rate of circulation water, and the depth and buried spaces of heat exchangers were considered by the case study. As a result, the temperature of circulation water and the heat exchange rate of the system were calculated in each case.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.487-496
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• 2012

Recently, utilization of building foundations as ground-coupled heat exchangers has attracted much attention because they reduce the cost and enhance the heat transfer. The objective of this study is to evaluate the performance of energy-slab ground-coupled heat exchanger installed in a commercial building. In order to demonstrate the energy transfer characteristics of the energy-slab, experiments were conducted from October 2010 to September 2011. The 1-year measurement results showed that the mean EWTs of brine returning from the energy-slab were $9.6^{\circ}C$ in heating season and $24.9^{\circ}C$ in cooling season, which were in a range of design target temperatures. In addition, the geothermal heat pump system with the energy-slab showed on-off operation according to the setting temperatures of secondary fluid in water storage tank. The results also showed that the energy-slab extracted heat of 198.6 kW from the ground and injected heat of 318.9 kW to the ground, respectively.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Geothermal and Hydrothermal Energy
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.22-32
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• 2022

To reduce energy consumption and CO₂ emission in building sector, a ground source heat pump system has been highly adopted due to its high efficient by many regulation. A certification system has been operated to distribute reliable and high-efficient heat pump units. In this study, the performance status of the recently certified ground source heat pump unit with components was investigated. All heat pump units certified from 2015 to 2020 were water to water heat pump types. Compared to the past, higher capacity systems over 400 kW have been certificed. The cooling COP of the heat pump unit based on certification criteria showed higher value than the heating COP. It is highly recommended to revise the certified criteria values considering operating conditions individually. Most of ground source heat pump units have employed scroll type compressors and plate type heat exchangers with HFC refrigerant.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.196-203
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• 2012

Energy foundations and other thermo-active ground structure, energy wells, energy-slab, and pavement heating and cooling represent an innovative technology that contributes to environmental protection and provides substantial long-term cost savings and minimized maintenance. This paper focuses on earth-contact concrete elements that are already required for structural reasons, but which simultaneously work as heat exchangers. Pipes, energy slabs, filled with a heat carrier fluid are installed under conventional structural elements, forming the primary circuit of a geothermal energy system. The natural ground temperature is used as a heat source in winter and a heat sink in summer. The geothermal heat pump system with energy-slab represented very high heating and cooling performance due to the stability of EWT from energy slab. However, the performance of it seemed to be affected by the atmospheric air temperature.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.28 no.7
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• pp.293-298
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• 2016

A three-dimensional (3D) numerical model of the vertical ground-coupled heat exchanger is useful for analyzing the modern ground source heat pump system. Furthermore, a detailed description of the inner side of the exchanger allows to account for the effects of the thermal capacity. Thus, both methods are included in the proposed numerical model. For the ground portion, a FDM (Finite Difference Method) scheme has been applied using the Cartesian coordinate system. Cylindrical grids are applied for the borehole portion, and the U-tube configuration is adjusted at the grid, keeping the area and distance unchanged. Two sub-models are numerically coupled at each time-step using an iterative method for convergence. The model is validated by a reference 3D model under a continuous heat injection case. The results from a periodic heat injection input show that the proposed thermal capacity model reacts more slowly to the changes, resulting in lower borehole wall temperatures, when compared with a thermal resistance model. This implies that thermal capacity effects may be important factors for system controls.