Institut Politècnic d’Innovació i Recerca en Sostenibilitat (INSPIRES)
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INSPIRES és un centre de recerca de la Universitat de Lleida. Conforma un grup multidisciplinari que posa especial atenció a la recerca al voltant de la millor gestió energètica, l’eficiència, la usabilitat, la seguretat, la computació d’altes prestacions i la resolució i optimització de problemes, entre altres temes. Tot amb nexes comuns, girant al voltant de l’àmbit de la sostenibilitat i la tecnologia. Suposa una unió d’esforços dels diferents centres de recerca que de manera separada tractaven diferents línies i àrees, ara aquests esforços es comparteixen generant sinèrgies.[Més informació].
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Browsing Institut Politècnic d’Innovació i Recerca en Sostenibilitat (INSPIRES) by Author "Abokersh, Mohamed Hany"
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- ItemOpen AccessA framework for sustainable evaluation of thermal energy storage in circular economy(Elsevier, 2021) Abokersh, Mohamed Hany; Norouzi, Masoud; Boer, Dieter; Cabeza, Luisa F.; Gasa, Gemma; Prieto, Cristina; Jiménez, Laureano; Vallès Rasquera, J. ManelThe circular economy can be promoted as a solution to support the sustainability market position of renewable energy systems. To design a circular and sustainable system, a structured approach is needed. The present study develops a methodology framework for sustainable circular system design (SCSD), aiming to assess thermal energy storage (TES) technologies from a sustainable perspective. To this end, a composite indicator, namely, environmental sustainability and circularity indicator (ESC) is provided. This indicator combines the environmental impacts of the TES system via the conduction of a life cycle assessment and its circulatory performance using the product-level material circularity indicator (MCI). The developed methodology is applied to a case study of high-temperature TES using molten salts as a part of a concentrated solar power plant. The SCSD embraces the analysis for the most relevant processes through proposing different ecological scenarios including, increasing the recycling rates (Modest Scenario), increasing the reuse rates (Medium Scenario), and a combination of both (Optimistic scenario). The circularity analysis showed that for the Modest, Medium and optimistic scenarios, the MCI moves from 20.6% for the current situation to 30.3%, 38.6%, and 46.4%, respectively. Accordingly, the optimistic scenario showed the most environmentally sustainable and circular scenario with ESC of 7.89%, whereas the Modest and Medium scenarios exhibited ESCs of 1.20% and 2.16%, respectively. A major obstacle for substantial improvement of the circulatory and ESC is the high share of unrecyclable molten salts in the system and therefore, any effort to improve the circulatory and the environmental benefits of this system can be reached by using more environmentally friendly alternative materials. The study concludes that the integration of reusing and recycling at the initial design should be sought in order to achieve a more environmentally sustainable and circular outcome.
- ItemOpen AccessA framework for the optimal integration of solar assisted district heating in different urban sized communities: A robust machine learning approach incorporating global sensitivity analysis(Elsevier, 2020) Abokersh, Mohamed Hany; Vallès Rasquera, J. Manel; Cabeza, Luisa F.; Boer, DieterA promising pathway towards sustainable transaction to clean energy production lies in the adoption of solar assisted district heating systems (SDHS). However, SDHS technical barriers during their design and operation phases, combined with their economic limitation, promote a high variation in quantifying SDHS benefits over their lifetime. This study proposes a complete multi-objective optimization framework using a robust machine learning approach to inherent sustainability principles in the design of SDHS. Moreover, the framework investigates the uncertainty in the context of SDHS design, in which the Global Sensitivity Analysis (GSA) is combined with the heuristics optimization approach. The framework application is illustrated through a case study for the optimal integration of SHDS at different urban community sizes (10, 25, 50, and 100 buildings) located in Madrid. The results reveal a substantial improvement in economic and environmental benefits for deploying SDHS, especially with including the seasonal storage tank (SST) construction properties in the optimization problem, and it can achieve a payback period up to 13.7 years. In addition, the solar fraction of the optimized SDHS never falls below 82.1% for the investigated community sizes with an efficiency above 69.5% for the SST. Finally, the GSA indicates the SST investment cost and its relevant construction materials, are primarily responsible for the variability in the optimal system feasibility. The proposed framework can provide a good starting point to solve the enormous computational expenses drawbacks associated with the heuristics optimization approach. Furthermore, it can function as a decision support tool to fulfill the European Union energy targets regarding clean energy production.
- ItemOpen AccessEconomic and environmental potential for solar assisted central heating plants in the EU residential sector: Contribution to the 2030 climate and energy EU agenda(Elsevier, 2019) Tulus, Victor; Abokersh, Mohamed Hany; Cabeza, Luisa F.; Vallès Rasquera, J. Manel; Jiménez, Laureano; Boer, DieterAligning with the ambitious EU 2030 climate and energy package for cutting the greenhouse emissions and replacing conventional heat sources through the presence of renewable energy share inside efficient district heating fields, central solar heating plants coupled with seasonal storage (CSHPSS) can have a viable contribution to this goal. However, the technical performance variation combined with inadequate financial assessment and insufficient environmental impact data associated with the deployment of those innovative district heating systems represents a big challenge for the broad implementation of CSHPSS in Europe. In this context, our paper presents a comprehensive evaluation for the possibility of integrating CSHPSS in the residential sector in various EU member states through the formulation of a multi-objective optimization framework. This framework comprises the life cycle cost analysis for the economic evaluation and the life cycle assessment for the environmental impact estimation simultaneously. The technical performance is also considered by satisfying both the space heating demand and the domestic hot water services. The methodological framework is applied to a residential neighborhood community of 1120 apartments in various EU climate zones with Madrid, Athens, Berlin, and Helsinki acting as a proxy for the Mediterranean continental, Mediterranean, central European, and Nordic climates, respectively. The optimization results regarding the energy performance show that the CSHPSS can achieve a renewable energy fraction above 90% for the investigated climate zones. At the same time, the environmental assessment shows significant improvement when using the CSHPSS in comparison to a natural gas heating system, in those cases the environmental impact is reduced up to 82.1-86.5%. On the other hand, substantial economic improvement is limited, especially in the Mediterranean climate zone (Athens) due to low heating demands and the prices of the non-renewable resources. There the total economic cost of the CSHPSS plants can increase up to 50.8% compared to a natural gas heating system. However, considering the incremental tendency in natural gas prices all over EU nowadays, the study of future plant costs confirms its favorable longterm economic feasibility.
- ItemOpen AccessFlexible heat pump integration to improve sustainable transition toward 4th generation district heating(Elsevier, 2020) Abokersh, Mohamed Hany; Saikia, Kangkana; Cabeza, Luisa F.; Boer, Dieter; Vallès Rasquera, J. ManelThe movement toward the 4th generation district heating (4GDH) embraces a great opportunity to support the future smart energy development concept. However, its development calls for addressing technological and economic obstacles aligning with the need for a reformation of the energy market to ensure the quality of service. In this context, our paper presents a comprehensive analysis based on a multi-objective optimization framework incorporating an artificial neural network-based model for the possibility of integrating heat pump (HP) into solar assisted district heating system (SDHS) with seasonal thermal energy storage to support the sustainable transition toward 4GDH. The study evaluates the performance of the proposed system with the help of key performance indicators (KPI) related to the 4GDH characteristics and key stakeholders for possible market growth with consideration for the environmental benefits. The proposed analysis is applied to a small neighbourhood of 10 residential buildings located in Madrid (Spain) to investigate the optimal integration of HP under different control strategies into a SDHS. Inherent the SDHS operator perspective, the results reveal a significant improvement in the stabilization of the SDHS performance due to the HP integration where the solar field temperature never exceeds 80 ◦C, and the seasonal storage tank (SST) temperature stands at 85.4 ◦C. In addition, the share of solar energy stands above 86.1% with an efficiency of 73.9% for the SST, while the seasonal HP performance factor stands above 5.5 for all optimal scenarios. From the investor viewpoint, an energy price of 59.1 Euro/MWh can be achieved for the proposed system with a payback period of 26 years. Finally, from the policymaker perspective, along with the significant economic and sustainable improvement in the SDHS performance, a substantial environmental improvement of 82.5% is achieved when compared to the conventional boiler heating system. The proposed analysis reflects a great motivation for different stakeholders to propose this system as a path toward the 4GDH in the future district energy systems.
- ItemOpen AccessTechno-economic analysis of control strategies for heat pumps integrated into solar district heating systems(Elsevier, 2021) Abokersh, Mohamed Hany; Vallès Rasquera, J. Manel; Saikia, Kangkana; Cabeza, Luisa F.; Boer, DieterThis present work focuses on assessing the techno-economic benefits of different control strategies for a heat pump integrated into the solar assisted district heating system (SDHS). The system has been developed using dynamic simulation software (TRNSYS) and optimized based on a genetic algorithm. With an industrial-sized heat pump connected to thermal storage tanks for domestic hot water (DHW) and space heating (SH) for the requirements of the community, a SDHS is operated by applying two different control mechanisms for the heat pump based on its reference operating temperature. The application of the methodology is applied to a residential neighborhood community of 10 buildings located in Madrid to act as a proxy for the Mediterranean climates. The results showed a significant effect for the heat pump control in the techno-economic benefits where the proposed system is able to provide a solar fraction up to 99%. Furthermore, the total electricity consumption of the heating system varied by 10% between the best and the worst cases. Besides, the annual seasonal storage efficiency improved up to 90% with a life cycle expense up to 67.12 Euro/MWh, and a payback period of 29 years.