A simple predesign tool for solar cooling, heating and domestic hot water production systems

In the framework of the MEGAPICS project “method toward guarantee of solar cooling and heating system”, a simplified pre-design tool for designer and planner has been elaborated.  The method is applied to a selected set of configuration schemes for solar cooling, heating and domestic hot water (DHW) production systems using absorption or adsorption chillers, assisted or not by hot and/or cold conventional back-up systems. The tool provides theoretical but realistic values of system performance indicators. Its main advantages compared to other tools are:

•  a few parameters are required ; most of them are pre-sized ones with automatic functions,
• the calculation time is reduced (about ten seconds), therefore the user can easily run several simulations so as to find the most suitable solution between component size and best performances.

The paper presents the tool, focusing on simplified component models and pre-design function. Validation results are provided, showing both experimental and theoretical results and their comparison.