Design and Characterization of Solar-Assisted Heating Plant in Domestic Houses

This paper deals with the development and characterization of an innovative domestic heating system that is driven by a solar-assisted heat pump to increase system efficiency. A suitable online measurement system of overall observable quantities has been integrated in the plant to give accurate and updated measurements of all the variables that are of interest to the whole system. A more detailed analysis of the quantities that mainly influence system performance has been carried out, and a suitable mathematical model that is able to describe and control the behavior of the interesting phenomena has been developed. The amount of heating energy depends on the local weather conditions. In the thermal plant proposed here, there is a solar energy harvesting device; this kind of plant needs a highly sensitive control system because of the great sensitivity of solar-powered systems to climatic variations. The use of the proposed system allows monitoring and controlling of the heating conditions of domestic houses without high environmental impact and energy costs.