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[TRNSYS-users] Solar Thermal Freeze Protection for water only systems.
All,
What approaches have you taken to estimate the energy cost of freeze protection for solar thermal systems.
What I have been doing is modeling it without any freeze protection. I then take the hours that the water in the pipes is below 2 degree C and determine what it would take to heat that water with electric resistance heat tape as I know what the volume of liquid is in the pipe. I ignore the mass of the pipe as I also don't get the effect of heat escaping from the building through the pipes.
Obviously this isn't as big of a problem for closed loop glycol systems, but that isn't always practical.
Thanks,
Fred
FRED BETZ PhD., LEED AP
SUSTAINABLE SYSTEMS ANALYST
AEI | AFFILIATED ENGINEERS, INC.
5802 Research Park Blvd. | Madison, WI 53719
P: 608.236.1175 | F: 608.238.2614
fbetz@aeieng.com | www.aeieng.com