A MODEL FOR EVALUATING THE ECONOMICS OF COOL STORAGE-SYSTEMS

Cool storage systems store a cooling medium produced during off-peak h ours to be used for cooling purposes in the on-peak hours. Their opera tion allows the customers' electricity use for cooling to be shifted t o off-peak periods, benefitting both the customer and the utility. Red uctions in electricity costs the customer must pay are possible and de pend upon the schedule of rates for electricity the customer faces. Th e savings also depend upon the climatic conditions of that area and th e characteristics of the cool storage system itself. In this paper a c omputer model is presented that can be used to calculate the daily, mo nthly, annual and present worth savings of alternate cool storage syst em designs. The model has been programmed to calculate automatically t he sensitivity of the savings for a range of alternative compressor ra tings. It has been implemented as part of the ICICLE computer code, a design tool being developed at the University of Texas at Austin to as sist thermal cool storage system designers, electric utilities, and cu stomers.