Schools allow for a greater variety of ground heat exchanger configurations than most other buildings. Most schools have large playground areas and provide enough space to install a horizontal ground heat exchanger rather than a more costly vertical ground heat exchanger. This often makes them a very suitable candidate for a geothermal system.
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Ashby School, Leicestershire, England
Status: Completed, Spring, 2011
Brief description:
An addition to the historical Ashby School, founded in 1567, decided to utilize a geothermal system for heating and cooling. Geo-Xergy worked with the geothermal consultant, Loopmasters Europe, to develop an energy model for the vertical ground heat exchanger.Innovations:
- Vertical ground heat exchanger with central water to water heat pump system
Project Partners:
Walkerton Clean Water Centre, Walkerton, ON
Status: Completed, June 2010
Brief description:
The Walkerton Clean Water Centre was built to conform to LEED Gold Standard. The building uses a distributed heat pump system connected to a horizontal ground heat exchanger.Geo-Xergy worked with the owner, the architectural and engineering design team to optimize the system design and design the horizontal ground heat exchanger. A horizontal ground heat exchanger was installed rather than a vertical ground heat exchanger because of the significant cost savings.
Geo-Xergy also provided thermal conductivity testing of the soil on site to help determine the most cost-effective depth of installation.
Innovations:
- Horizontal trenched ground heat exchanger was built on site because of significant cost savings versus vertical ground heat exchanger
Project Partners:
Prairie Dale School, Schanzenfeld, MB
Status: Scheduled to open September 2011
Brief description:
Geo-Xergy worked with MCM Architects and MCW AGE Consulting Engineers to develop a cost effective approach for the design of a ground heat exchanger by building a detailed energy model to estimate energy costs and cost of the ground heat exchanger.Prairie Dale School is the first school with a geothermal system in approximately 15 years, and the first school with a ground heat exchanger installed with horizontal directional drilling.
A thermal conductivity test was conducted by Geo-Xergy using a probe type meter to ensure the size of the ground heat exchanger was adequate.
Innovations:
- Horizontal directional drilling ground heat exchanger
- Central plant geothermal heat pump system
Project Partners:
College Universitaire de St. Boniface - Pavillon des Sciences de la Sante, Winnipeg, MB
Status: Completed, winter, 2010
Brief description:
Geo-Xergy was commissioned to design a ground heat exchanger that could be constructed with minimal disruption to a recently paved parking lot and playing field for the 25,000 square foot (2,400 m2) addition to the St. Boniface College in Winnipeg.Future plans for the property limited the amount of space available for the construction of a ground heat exchanger. A design with deep vertical boreholes increased the cost of the geothermal system to the point it was not economically feasible.
Detailed energy modeling, TC Testing of the clay soil and modeling of the ground heat exchanger showed there was adequate space to install a horizontally directional drilled system under the recently paved parking lot with almost no disruption to the site.
Innovations:
- Horizontal directional drilling ground heat exchanger drilled under existing parking lot with very little site disruption during construction
