Environmental assessment of hybrid ground source heat pump systems

A hybrid ground source heat pump (HGSHP) system can provide cost-effective heating and cooling for buildings. This system is normally designed to minimise lifetime costs. However, the lowest lifetime cost solution is typically not the one with the lowest emissions. With the recent increase in the awareness of climate change, society often desires to minimise the emissions generated from heating and cooling systems. In this paper, an HGSHP system design method is proposed with the objective that considers both costs and emissions by using a Pareto optimal approach. The design of such system is affected by the climatic conditions, the efficiency of the heating and cooling systems, the energy price and emissions for electricity and gas at each location. Potential changes in these factors are also investigated in this paper.