Decarbonised heating

About

Our system reduces energy costs and carbon when heating and utilises innovation from Soltropy Ltd and TCS Ltd and is currently being trialled in a £330K, Innovate UK project at a creamery in Cumbria, UK.

Soltropy’s solar thermal system can freeze and overheat without damage and doesn’t use antifreeze, instead, the heat transfer fluid is water which doesn’t degrade if it overheats. Traditional solar thermal heating systems using antifreeze are designed to never overheat as the antifreeze degrades. They are designed for the sunniest day so as not to overheat the antifreeze heat transfer fluid and so are undersized for cloudy days and for most of the year. In contrast we can have a huge system that allows the panel to overheat on sunny days if the energy isn’t used but is big enough to harvest energy on cloudy days, increasing the yield and ROI. Even a correctly designed antifreeze system still needs the antifreeze changed every 3 to 5 years and if there is a pump failure the antifreeze in the panel will degrade and need replaced.

Our system also uses a modular clamp manifold that thermally connects the heat pipe condenser of a standard evacuated tube collector to a flexible, continuous, pipe carrying the water to heat and allows size optimisation by using the required number of modules and more importantly, no additional plumbing connections. As an example, 60 m2 of Naked Energy solar thermal requires around 240 plumbing connections which are all potential failure points as well as increasing installation and commissioning time. In contrast we have two connections. If required this heat is then boosted by TCS’s solid-state heat pump which can take heat from the solar thermal or the air. TCS’s heat pump doesn’t require refrigerant and is very compact compared to traditional heat pumps.

We also have a prototype internet of things sensor network that reports on the temperature of each individual evacuated tube to determine if it is faulty, this is a world first. This is being developed as a retro fit to all heating technologies, including heat pumps and will allow planned maintenance without the need to visit the installation. This amalgamated data will be presented in a dashboard. It will also utilise blockchain to securely log carbon saved which could be used for ESG purposes or carbon trading.

Several low-carbon heat technologies exist but have limitations -

1.Photovoltaic panels produce sun-dependent zero-carbon energy at ~ 20% efficiency but often system size is capped due to grid capacity limitations.

2.Solar thermal panels produce sun-dependent zero-carbon heat at ~60% efficiency. Cold regions use antifreeze heat transfer fluid, limiting system size to not overheat and degrade the antifreeze on the sunniest days, so are undersized for cloudy days, reducing yield. Multiple panels are plumbed together introducing failure points.

3.Propane and CO2 heat pumps only efficiently provide heat up to ~75°C, with average coefficient of performance(COP) of ~3.

Our system integrates 4 innovations to provide heat up to 99 °C. This can be used for water and space heating as well as process heat for industry.

Innovation 1,2&3 - Soltropy Ltd's IOT-enabled, modular solar thermal system has no interconnections, freezes and overheats without damage and doesn't use antifreeze. Latest innovation is at TRL 9 with MVP running since 2019 and was developed with help from Innovate UK and Heriot-Watt University. IOT connectivity is at TRL3 and is currently being funded with £50K from Scottish Enterprise.

Innovation 4-- TCS Ltd's solid-state thermoelectric heat pump utilises the Peltier effect offering silent, maintenance-free operation. It can achieve COPs as high as 20 with temperatures up 99°C. It is currently at TRL9 and was funded by BEIS.