Feasibility of Residential Combined Cooling, Heating, and Power Generation System in Canada

In order to investigate the feasibility of a combined heating, cooling, and power generation system in the residential sector, an integrated system was designed and installed at the Archetype Sustainable House (ASH) of the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA). A Stirling engine based cogeneration unit was used to produce the thermal energy for a thermally driven chiller. The engine supplies hot water up to 95°C. The overall efficiency of up to 90% is determined for the cogeneration system. A thermo-chemical accumulator provided by the ClimateWell AB, was installed and connected to the cogeneration unit. The experimental coefficient of performance (COP) of this chiller during the test period was less than 0.4. Since the ClimateWell chiller rejects heat during both charging and discharging processes, a heat recovery system using three cascade tanks and an outdoor fan coil was designed and installed to utilize the waste heat, for domestic hot water production. A complete TRNSYS model of the tri-generation system was used to verify the experimental results.