Energy, exergy and uncertainty analyses of the thermal response test for a ground heat exchanger

This paper presents energy, exergy and uncertainty analyses for the thermal response test of a ground heat exchanger. In this study, a vertical U-shaped ground heat exchanger with 80m depth and 20 cm borehole diameter is installed for the first time at the university premises in Saudi Arabia. A mobile thermal response apparatus is constructed and used to measure the performance of the ground heat exchanger. The thermal response test was carried out four times at different thermal loads from September 2007 to April 2008. The energy and exergy transports of these thermal response tests were analyzed using the experimental results obtained in this period. The analysis provides a better understanding of the overall performance of vertical ground heat exchangers, verifies the thermal response test results and improves the experimental setup.