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In this paper, the coupling of a high temperature heat pump with a combined cooling, heat, and power system is investigated. The plant converts the input energy source (natural gas) into electricity and useful thermal energy by means of a cogenerator. Part of the thermal energy feeds an absorption chiller that produces the cooling energy to satisfy the cooling load of an existing industrial building located in northern Italy. The heat pump enhances the low temperature heat from the condenser and absorber of the absorption chiller to high temperature heat to integrate the hot water produced by the cogenerator. The energy performance of the entire plant is analyzed by means of steady-state simulations at both fixed conditions and on an annual operation to meet the heating, cooling, and electric needs of the building varying different parameters and compared to traditional systems for energy production. As the main results, the integrated system provides flexibility and achieves valuable energy performances, in the range of a few tens of percent with respect to benchmark energy production systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The availability of reliable and up-to-date data on energy uses and consumption is a key aspect in order to achieve the goals set out by European Directives on energy efficiency, and to monitor the effectiveness of energy policies supporting buildings' retrofit actions. In such a context, a numerical model, implemented in Excel' and Matlab', was developed in order to determine the energy consumption for space heating, domestic hot water and cooking in households, based on a statistical dataset of 20,000 records collected in a survey on the energy consumption of Italian families carried out by the National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT). The space heating model is based on the definition of classes of dwelling-types, while the energy use for DHW and cooking are calculated on a record-by-record basis according to a Standard-based approach. The present paper presents the results of a refined version of the model, in particular the calibration of relevant parameters accounted for the secondary equipment for space heating, resulting in improvements in the reliability for the allocation of the fuel consumption among the end-uses. The refinement and validation of the model are still in progress, since they are functional for the assessment of the energy consumption of households in the period between two subsequent surveys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present work is focused on technical feasibility of heating system design of two School District situated in the town of Matera. This paper analyses three different heating system highlighting for each of them advantages and disadvantages respect energy covered and environmental impact. To design heating system we conducted a previous energy audit in dynamic conditions on School District. This previous step is necessary to define energy demand and the best strategies to improve energy efficiency of these structures. Before to design heating system, we applied some envelope improvement on numerical model built with Design Builder software. In Fact, the school building which took part in School District has a high heat loss surface because they were built before the first Italian Law on energy efficiency. The heating system typologies considered in this study are: high temperature absorption heat pump integrated with a solar thermal system, high temperature electrical heat pump and cogeneration system. The first heating system typology has a great advantage in terms of primary energy because the conversion factor from natural gas to primary energy is equal to 1.05. The second one, high temperature electrical heat pump, has a great energy efficiency respect to the first one (2.50 vs 1.65) but, in term of primary energy, this system is not so convenient. In fact, the conversion factor from electricity to primary energy is equal to 1.95. The third one, cogeneration system, has the advantages to cover not only heating request but also electric request of school district. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]