Heat recovery ventilation with closed-loop ground heat exchange

In this article, it will be shown how heat recovery ventilation with closed-loop ground heat exchange performs in practice, in a residential building in Nijeveen, The Netherlands. A state diagram is presented to explain when heat recovery and/or ground heat exchange is used during the year.

The correlation between ground temperatures and air temperatures shows how the ground preheats the incoming outdoor air from -13°C to 0°C in winter, and precools the incoming outdoor air from 30°C to 23°C in summer. After preheating or precooling, the outdoor air enters the ventilation unit where heat is recovered (only in winter) and the air is distributed to the rooms.

The benefit of heat recovery in winter is expressed in terms of avoided heating relative to ventilation without heat recovery and results in 3899 kWh. The benefit in summer is expressed as free cooling, with reference to the indoor temperature, and results in 950 kWh