Part 1 - Energy in the home, personal energy use and home energy efficiency.
Estimate your personal Annual Energy Usage for the following - list all data in kWh (KiloWatt hours):
Space Heating (Central heating, room heaters etc. - if you share a central system, e.g. in a flat or Hall, estimate your personal use).
Space cooling (if you have air conditioning at home)
Cooking (Gas cooker, microwave, sandwich toaster, toaster etc.)
Lighting (All lights in your house/flat)
Other domestic use (TV, Electronics, including computers, X-box etc)
Transport (Public transport/car/motor cycle, including air travel if used)
Total ______________kWh
Then convert this figure to kg of CO2 (Carbon dioxide) and Tonnes of Oil Equivalent (TOE).
If you use a web based calculator you should check that the conversions are appropriate for your location. (If the calculator does not state conversion factors, you can usually determine them by putting single inputs (e.g. 1000kW electricity) into calculator and seeing what the output is).
TOTAL (kg of CO2)........................................
TOTAL (TOE)...................................................
The average UK per capita consumption is ~4TOE/annum,
The average UAE per capita consumption is ~11TOE/annum
NOW:
(a) Identify one item of energy saving equipment which you could incorporate in your house/flat/room or apartment block to replace one of your existing items mentioned above.
(b) Estimate the installed cost of the item and the annual savings (energy and financial) which would result.
(c) Hence estimate the simple payback period.
(d) Why have you not installed this equipment?
Part 2 Efficient use of ‘waste' heat and renewable heat sources
1. Describe how you might recover heat from (a) a process exhaust gas stream (e.g. from an oven) and (b) a process warm water stream (e.g. from a commercial dishwasher). Discuss any aspects of the streams that may influence your choice of heat recovery system.
2. An industrial dryer operates for 60 hours/week, 50 weeks/year. It exhausts 200 kW/hr of heat and the value of the energy is 6p/kWh. A heat exchanger of 50% efficiency is put into the exhaust stream to recover a proportion of this heat. The installed cost of the heat exchanger is £22,500. The heat exchanger pressure drop needs a 2 kW fan to overcome it, and the cost of electricity is 10p/kWh
Calculate the simple payback period for the installation, taking into account the running costs, as well as the benefits.
3. A domestic air conditioning unit has a COPcof 2 Thinking of the refrigeration cycle and the inefficiencies in the various components, how could you attempt to increase the COP by modifying components?
4. The industrial dryer in Question 2 currently uses a heat exchanger for heat recovery. If the exhaust air is highly humid, as would be common on a dryer, there would be advantages in recovering latent heat as well as sensible heat. (Often you will find that the latent heat content is substantially greater than the sensible heat content).
Discuss how you might configure a heat pump which could recover the latent heat (and sensible heat) from the exhaust air then deliver it to the incoming fresh air. Is it possible now to recycle the exhaust air? If so, how would you reheat it?
5. Prime movers are being studied for powering combined heat & power (CHP) units in the home and in industry.
Sketch how the heat from these prime movers (e.g. a gas turbine, a small Diesel engine or another prime mover) can be recovered for (a) water heating, (b) providing chilled water (an outline of appropriate refrigerating equipment is required).