Direct involvement for those of us in the industry always held back by the daily grind. Sometimes we all must step forward and participate to move the ball.
As adjunct at Oklahoma State University, Oklahoma City Campus, with the sustainable/renewable program, I recognized a need to begin the process of "getting the research" together. This is an effort to do just that.
The OG+E Project:
Oklahma Gas and Electric Services, OG+E, is guiding a research project that is considering reducing ground source loop lengths and costs and follows ONRL's 2008 -
"Geothermal (Ground-Source) Heat Pumps:Market Status, Barriers to Adoption, and Actions to Overcome Barriers" document by Patrick Hughes.
The project focuses on borehole resistance and used various configurations of the ground heat exchanger (ghex). The site chosen was the Habitat for Humanity in NW Oklahoma City. Collaborators are OG+E (www.oge.com), Oak Ridge National Labs (ONRL www.onrl.gov), Bariod Industrial Products (www.bariodidp.com), and ClimaterMaster (www.climatemaster.com), IGSHPA (www.igshpa.okstate.edu), and Ewbank Geo Testing (www.geotctest.com). Participants provided labor, materials and installation for various ghex configurations. Two pass or normal loops, four pass or two loops per borehole, HDPE and fiberglass concentrics, and horizontal loops were installed.
The borehole drilling process was monitored and a suite of electronic logs conducted. The logs included deviation, caliper, spontaneous potential., resistance., gamma, short (16") and long (64") normal resistance. Drill fluid weights at total depth were measured along with wall cake build. As the ghexs were installed the grouts were measured in the field for weights in #/gal and thermal conductivity. A lot was learned from this; and I will detail this in another blog.
12 ground source homes received new ClimateMaster two ton HVAC units with two speeds. Data acquisition units from OSU/IGSHPA were installed to measure the units and ghexs. While operating the systems are recorded at one minute intervals. This documentation is providing a treasure trove for our industry.
Soon a web site will be available to follow the operations, review the documentation, see the field measurements for all our industry.
I am excited with the opportunities this will provide for ground source.
Garen
