Experimental results of a sensible heat storage system for residential andlight commercial application

This paper presents the performance results for a sensible heat storage sys tem. The system under study operates as an air source heat pump which store s the compressor heat of rejection as domestic hot water or hot water in a storage tank that can be used as a heat source for providing building heati ng. Although measurements were made to quantify space cooling, space heatin g, and domestic water heating, this paper emphasizes the space heating perf ormance of the unit. The heat storage system was tested for different indoo r and outdoor conditions to determine parameters such as heating charge rat e, compressor power, and coefficient of performance (COP). The thermal stor age tank was able to store a full charge of heat. The rate of increase of s torage tank temperature increased with outdoor temperature. The heating rat e during a charge test, best shown by the normalized rate plots, increased with evaporating temperature due to the increasing mass flow rate and refri gerant density. At higher indoor temperature during the discharge tests, th e rate of decrease of storage tank temperature was slower. Also, the discha rge heating rate decreased with time since the thermal storage tank tempera ture decreased as less thermal energy became available for use. Copyright ( C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.