Jordanian researchers have developed a solar-powered heat pump system to heat a swimming pool at a hotel in the coastal city of Aqaba. They found that the payback period of the system is only 1.94 years, and the total profit after ten years of operation can be about $1.88 million.
A team of scientists from Jordan’s Muttah University and Amman’s Golden Energy have assessed the energy and economic performance of a photovoltaic heat pump system used to heat swimming pools in a hotel building in the coastal city of Aqaba.
Their modeling showed that the hotel’s average annual electricity consumption is around 6.5 MWh, and the total annual electricity bill is JD591,000 ($834,000). They suggested that a 408.2 kW photovoltaic system was deployed on the roof of the hotel with a 5-degree slope. The cost of the photovoltaic system is estimated at JD 244,920 or JD 600 ($846.20) per installed kW. The total cost of the solar heat pump system is JD 360,920.
The hotel has a 310 square meter family pool, a 515 square meter main pool and a 380 square meter spa pool. Between October and March, a lot of heat is needed to heat the indoor and outdoor pools. Use a heat transfer model to evaluate the performance of a pool heating system.
The model takes into account heat losses due to evaporation and convection, as well as conductive, radiative and additional heat losses. “A pool’s ability to dissipate or absorb heat is entirely dependent on its location, environmental conditions, and time of day and night,” the scientists explained. “The balance of heat transfer also depends on where the pool is installed, whether indoors or outdoors.”
Evaporative heat loss has been found to be the most significant of any swimming pool, with the heat generated by a photovoltaic heat pump providing hot water between 35 and 60 degrees Celsius, largely to offset these losses. On the contrary, the impact of other losses is considered to be minimal.
According to scientists, the electricity generated by the heat pump system can significantly reduce the energy consumption of electric heaters during all months of operation of the house and the main pool. As for the spa, it can also be heated by a steam boiler running on liquefied gas, and the savings are also significant. The annual savings are estimated at JD 26,506 and JD 43,891 for the home and main pools, respectively, and JD 17,328 for the spa pool.
“Compared to the proposed photovoltaic system, the hotel’s electricity requirement is 6,500 MWh per year, the total cost is JD 591,000, and the annual electricity production is about 786 MWh. The annual net electricity consumption can be calculated as 5,714 MWh, the total cost is JD 514,000, which means that the proposed system will save about JD 185,850 per year on the total electricity bill,” stressed the Jordan Group. “The cash flow value turned positive at the end of the second year and remained positive throughout the ten-year evaluation period. The reason is that the total energy production of the system is large and the initial costs are relatively modest.”
The proposed heat pump system had a payback period of only 1.94 years, with a reported total profit of JD 1,338,931 ($1.89 million) after ten years of operation. “A cursory analysis of the economics of the solar project showed that it is economically justified,” the scientists concluded.
The design of the system is described in the article “Energy Efficiency and Economic Evaluation of Photovoltaic Heat Pump Systems” published in the journal Engineering Results.
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