Thermal performance evaluation of an earth-to-air heat exchanger for the heating mode applications using an experimental test rig

This paper presents the experimental investigation of an earth-to-air heat exchanger for heating purposes in the Patna region of India, using an experimental test rig. In the view of the author, real field experiments have several limitations such as lack of repeatability and uncontrolled conditions. It also takes more time for the response of parameters that depends on nature and climate. Moreover, earth-to-air heat exchangers may be expensive to fabricate and require more land area. Thus, in this work authors executed their experimental work in indoor controllable environments to investigate the thermal performance of an earth-to-air heat exchanger. The actual soil conditions were created and maintained the temperature at 26°C throughout the soil in the vicinity of pipes. Three horizontal PVC pipes of equal lengths and diameters of 0.0285 m, 0.038 m and 0.0485 m were installed in the test rig. The experiments were performed for different inlet air velocities at ambient air temperature. This study acknowledges that the maximum rise in outlet temperature occurs at a lower speed for smaller pipes. Also, the maximum effectiveness of 0.83 was observed at 2 m/s for the smallest diameter pipe.