Sport swimming facility at Oggiono lake
Departing from the wish to contain energy costs, on the shores of Oggiono lake closed to Lecco, a sport swimming facility has been realized, where the use of fuels has been completely eliminated thanks to the installation of geothermic heat pumps and to the application of heat recovery technologies.
| Country | Italy |
| City | Oggiono (Lecco) |
| Client name | Centro Stendhal Sport Club |
| Application area | Building sector |
| Year of construction | 2002 |
| Heat source/sink | Water/Water |
| Heat pump type | Electric heat pump |
| Year of installation | 2002 |
| Purpose | Heating and cooling |
| Heat source system | Aquifer/wells |
| Operation mode | Bivalent |
| Contact name | New-en srl |
| Contact website | http://www.new-en.con; http://www.stendhalsportclub.it |
Project description
Building, overall energy concept
The "Stendhal Sport Club" project, a sporting centre realized in 2002 on the shores of the lake including three external swimming pools, two covered and a fitness area, an health farm, a restaurant, a cafe (total surface 35.000 m2), has been developed in order to reduce the energy consumptions and to use renewable energy sources to satisfy the residual energy requirement. In order to reduce energy consumptions, special heat recovery systems have been installed: they allow to preserve energy introduced in the thermal circuit without dispersing it, redistributing it to the different users. The recovery heat exchangers have been integrated to the ventilation systems, to humidity control systems and to warm water drains, in order to let off outside only cold fluids with a high heat recovery. To satisfy the residual thermal requirement a geothermal heat pump with a high efficiency has been installed and it is fed by lake's water from a well.
Figure 1: Areal view of Stendhal Sport club (Source: Stendhal Sport Club)
A sport facility, as the one in Oggiono, is characterized by a very high energy demand with a great impact on economical accounts. Particularly, as illustrated in the Figure 3, the main part of consumed energy is used for building and swimming pool water heating.
Altogether a plant with a traditional heat recovery system needs an average thermal power equal to 337,2 kW. In our case, the plant designers have followed an energy saving policy investing on a high recovery of thermal energy in order to reduce the energy requirement.
Figure 2: Areal view of Stendhal Sport club (Source: Stendhal Sport Club)
As represented in the scheme below, through heat recovery from renovation water of the swimming pools, from drain waters of the showers and from the air of pools and showers rooms, it is possible to reduce the energy requirement to satisfy with boiler to around the 26% of the total.
Heat pump system
Altogether a plant with a traditional heat recovery system needs an average thermal power equal to 337,2 kW. In our case, the plant designers have followed an energy saving policy investing on a high recovery of thermal energy in order to reduce the energy requirement.
As represented in the scheme below, through heat recovery from renovation water of the swimming pools, from drain waters of the showers and from the air of pools and showers rooms, it is possible to reduce the energy requirement to satisfy with boiler to around the 26% of the total.
Figure 4: Heating and cooling plant with geothermal heat pump (Source: New-en SRL)
This plan typology makes available at the same time warm and cold water, allowing to heat an area (for example, the swimming pools area) and to cool another one (e.g. the gym). With the aim to contain at most the electric power, heat pump has been realized with 12 integrated submodules. This choice has allowed to obtain a modulation of the power, according to requirements, and a high reliability. Also water flow withdrawn by the well and by the plant is proportionate to the instant power in order to economize the electric consumption of the pumps. The heat pump is fed by lake's water (circulation of 23 litres/sec) with a temperature of 14 °C. Analysing the carried out tests, it results that the annual average power used by the whole complex has been of 114,3 kW with a COP of 5,5, equal to the 33,9% of the whole demand. The remainder has been furnished by energy recycling obtained by heat recovery systems.
Operation experiences
After five years (2002-2007) the adopted technological choices in the Oggiono's structure have allowed an important energy and economical savings and therefore an improvement of the indoor conditions, specially in terms of efficient humidity control. The result has been positive in all respects: the operating cost, the required maintenance, the total independence from traditional fuels, the operation continuity.
Costs, economic efficiency, incentives
Economical results and comparison with a traditional plant
Through the application of the best heat recovery technologies and the realization of a geothermal heat pump it has been possible to reduce the operating costs of around 70%, in comparison to the use of a traditional thermal plant (condensing boiler efficiency equal to 104%).
As illustrated in the figure 5, using heat recovery system and heat pump, the economical saving is over 100.000 €/year. It is clear that also the only use of the two heat recovery units would allow an interesting economical saving. Considering the initial investment and the cost for the realization of the collecting wells, the pay back period is 3/4 years.
Regulations, guidelines, benchmarking
No information available
References
"Relazione Impianti Termici", 2004. New-en srl
"Risparmi energetici nella piscina di Oggiono, presso Lecco". Edizioni Publipam - IMPIANTI n° 3 - dicembre 2004
"Il risparmio energetico approda sulle rive del lago". Comp-Etic - CR MAGAZINE, aprile 2006
| Design value | Measured data | |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 2002 | 2005 |
| Heating capacity (kW) | 543,2 | 543,2 |
| Cooling capacity (kW) | 97,0 | 97,0 |
| COP (Heating, appliance) | 5,6 | 5,5 |
| Institution/Company | New-en srl |
| Responsibility/Function | - |
| Street/PoBox | Via Curiel, 46 |
| ZIP | 20050 |
| City | Mezzago (Milano) |
| Country | Italy |
| Contact Person | Dr. Daniele Pavan |
| Phone/Fax | - |
| info@new-en.com | |
| Website (URL) | http://www.new-en.com |
