Solar thermal implementation for an energy efficient commercial building

Abstract

The power generation has risen significantly due to the constant energy demand. Emphasizing this, several initiatives have been taken to consume energy efficiently in order to reduce energy demand. Buildings that could contribute in sufficing their energy demand by utilizing renewable energy would help reduce the amounts of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) produced by the building. Hence, technological approach could succeed in developing an energy efficient building. The objective of this report is to obtain a clear idea of energy efficiency comprising of renewable energy implementation in commercial buildings. Moreover, reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to the environment for further improve sustainability of the world. The solar thermal collector is very commonly used to extract energy from sunlight. The energy efficiencies of the solar collector were analysed at different models depending on the collector area available for the solar collector. Therefore, energy efficiency curves for the solar thermal collector were presented. The energy demand for the system were calculated based on the experimental values for the overall system. Based on the tested models, the most efficient model was identified through sensitivity analysis between collector area and solar thermal yield. The highest and lowest solar yield achieved is 1,516 MWh/a and 0.798 MWh/a respectively. The system overall energy efficiency was determined ranging to be 90-95% for all models. This study can assist in selecting a proper solar thermal collector and storage size for buildings of various capacity and possible improvement in the design of the system components.