Employing heat pumps to recover low grade industrial thermal resources for space heating and cooling

Abstract

The use of heat pumps to upgrade and recover low grade industrial thermal resources is an opportunity for industry to deliver low cost space heating at a reduced carbon footprint. Heat pumps also offer the potential to provide space heating and space cooling from a single unit. To facilitate rapid determination of the potential for low grade heat recovery using ground source heat pumps, a rapid scoping method was developed capable of establishing critical temperatures to help elucidate which resources are most likely to be recovered economically. To demonstrate the applicability of the rapid scoping method, an analysis of various process cooling waters present at a smelter site was undertaken. The implications for cost and carbon dioxide emissions, were both analyzed for this facility, although the concepts developed can be employed to any site that generates large quantities of thermally low-grade heat.