Reduced the cooling load and improved insulation effect on Iraqi buildings using the geothermal energy storage

Abstract EN

A numerical study has been done on Iraqi buildings (Baghdad) on 21st July to reduce the cooling load using a new system of geothermal energy.

For this purpose, a flat vertical plate with high thermal conductivity extended into ground in 3 m deep used with eastern and southern walls construction.

The study shows that when using a plate only (without insulation) the cooling load is reduced by (13.2 %) and (12.7%) for eastern and southern walls respectively.

In addition, it shows that when using insulation at different arrangements the plate at the southern wall succeeds reduce in the cooling load by (8%, 14.5% and 40 %) and (8%, 15.8% and 41.3%) at the eastern wall.

The study shows also that at some arrangements using flat plate with insulation, one can reach a very smooth cooling load distribution for southern and eastern walls, which gives a good and easy controlling of air temperature of the space.

Also it can be seen from this study that the plate reduces the temperature of the walls outside surface especially when using insulation at the outside surface which means that the plate reduces the temperature and dissipates the thermal stresses which cause the cracks in the walls outside surface.

The temperature reduction occurs in both walls at peak load, which means that the heat is dissipated to the ground.

As the inside, temperature of the wall surface has a great effect on the thermal comfort of occupants in the conditioned space and on the natural convection inside the space, when there is a good coincidence between the southern and eastern walls there will be a better thermal comfort.

The plate also succeeded in making the inside surface temperature of the southern and eastern walls very close.

The available experimental data from the literature for solar radiation, outdoor temperature and under-ground soil temperature gave a good agreement when compared with the theoretical results obtained from the used equations and programs in this research.