Residential and commercial cogeneration systems assessment. Final report mar 81-feb 82

Technical Report · Mon Mar 01 04:00:00 EST 1982

OSTI ID:6505162

Bullard, C W; Pien, S

It is possible for cogenerators to be producers of peak and intermediate load electricity if they are designed with enough storage capacity to track daily thermal loads in buildings. The thermal storage would act to buffer any mismatch between thermal loads and electric utility peak periods. Over a wide range of technical performance characteristics and thermal load profiles, it appears that cogeneration systems having installed costs in the $500 to $1500kW range will be economically feasible if they can be sized to take advantage of peak and intermediate electricity values in the range of 6 to 9 cents/kWh. These results were obtained assuming a fuel cost of 2 cents/kWh t ($6/MMBtu). The optimal size of such systems is often larger than the building's peak thermal load. The analysis also pointed to several areas where research and development might be focused: thermal storage systems, exhaust gas heat recovery, reliability and durability, and mass production of packages systems to reduce the initial installed cost. The importance of improving the efficiency of exhaust gas heat recovery will increase significantly as gas prices rise.

• Research Organization: Illinois Univ., Urbana (USA). Dept. of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering
• OSTI ID: 6505162
• Report Number(s): PB-82-240037
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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