Thermal Performance of EATHE System with Water Impregnation

In a typical Earth to Air Heat Exchanger (EAHE) system hot/cold outdoor air during summer/winter is passed through the grounded buried pipes. When air flows through the pipes, heat is exchanged to/from the soil. As a result, temperature of air at the outlet of EAHE is much higher/lower than that of the ambient air. During summer the outlet air coming from EAHE can be directly used for space cooling if its temperature is low enough after heat exchanging process. The effectiveness and performance of EAHE system can also be increased by increasing soil moisture content. Both the configurations of EAHE (dry/wet) can contribute to the reduction in energy consumption for space conditioning. The EAHE system is also called EATHE (earth air tunnel heat exchanger). The experimental set up is comprising of two identical EATHE systems, each having 60 m long horizontal PVC pipes of diameter 0.10 m, 0.075 m, 0.05 m buried in flat land with dry soil at a depth of 3.7 m. The soil temperature at a depth of 3.7 m from ground surface was measured 27.1 ℃ which remain constant round the clock, that depend on geographical conditioning of that particular location.