New President of European Geo-thermal Technology Panel

Javier Urchueguía, partner and founder of ‘Energesis’ was recently elected Geothermal Technology Panel of the European Technology Platform on Renewable Heating & Cooling. Mr. Urchueguía is a Professor at Valencia Polytechnic University.

The panel is composed of three Focus Groups: Shallow geothermal and heat pumps, Deep geothermal and Non-technological issues. The other members of the international panel are:

Alexander Aposteanu, ASA, Romania

Attila Kujbus, CEGE, Hungary

Burkhard Sanner, EGEC, Belgium

Christian Boissavy, Cabinet Boissavy, France

Constantinos Karytsas, CRES, Greece

Cristoph Clauser, Aachen University/E.ON Energy Research Centre, Germany

Elianne Demollin-Schneiders, Gemeeente Heerlen, The Netherlands

Ernst Henges, GFZ - German Research Centre for Geosciences, Germany

Fabrice Boissier (chair), BRGM, France

Goerige Hatziyannis, IGME, Greece

Giuseppe de Natale, National Italian Institute for Geophysics and Volcanology, Italy

Ingo Sass, TU Darmstadt, Germany

Javier Urchueguia (vice chair), APPA, Spain

Jean Philippe Gibaud (vice chair), Schlumberger, France

Olafur Flovenz, ISOR, Iceland

Olof Andersson, Sweco Environment AB, Sweden

Pierre Ungemach, GPC IP, France

Savinio Basta, Geotermia.org, Italy

Thomas Kölbel, EnBW, Germany

Viktor Van Heekeren, Van Heekeren & Frima Consultants, The Netherlands.

Energesis Ingeniería, a company created in December 2004 by two Valencia Polytechnic teachers and researchers, Javier F. Urchueguía and Pedro Fernández de Córdoba, has created the first building in Spain whose heating and air conditioning systems are regulated by a hybrid of a geo-thermal system, taking advantage of heat stored in the ground, and conventional systems.

The office building, situated in Gandia, belongs to the company Azimut, and consists of four floors with a total area of 1,350 square metres. The new system will mean a 20-40% saving on electricity bills and a drastic reduction of carbon dioxide emissions.

Azimut, who manufacture boats, will also be including a nautical museum on their premises.

The new system takes advantage of heat stored in the ground as a result of sunlight and can be used to supply central heating, air conditioning and hot water without the burning of fossil fuels and their consequent pollution.

Traditional problems such as diseases transmitted by dirty vents are also eliminated with the new system due to the non-use of refrigeration towers and, furthermore, the system is completely silent. Ugly, dripping units on the façade of the building are also a thing of the past.

Initial building and implementation costs are one of the greatest problems facing companies considering the use of this innovative technology, although developments in the Energesis  system permit a saving of 25% on a system which redeems its initial investment faster than conventional systems through reduced running costs, as well as having a longer life span than conventional systems.

The system is far more efficient than traditional ones, which depend on an exchange of air with the exterior, whereas the new system exchanges energy with the subsoil with its largely constant temperature.

The system consists of water circulating through a series of underground tubes and water pumps using the ‘Inverter’ system, technology developed by the Japanese firm Mitsubishi. The installation of the system required 16 shafts to be dug at a depth of 100 metres, calculated using an innovative mobile laboratory created by Energesis, which can measure and analyse data in order to determine, in a simple way, the thermal conductivity underground and in other structures.

This mobile laboratory offers reliable information for the design of geothermal air conditioning installations. The management of this installation is possible through a software tool which receives the data via GSM. With this application the details of any experiment can be tracked from a distance.

To determine the ground’s thermal characteristics, which are necessary to install a geothermal air conditioning and heating system, the mobile laboratory injects or extracts the heat in the ground through a buried water circuit and measures the underground thermal response. This procedure is new, as until now it was only possible to do research using heat injection, and not extraction.

This technology has been developed by Energesis Ingeniería under the program GESTA (Advanced Technology Solutions Generation). The GESTA project aims at helping SMEs by generating interest in technological solutions that promote the industrial progress of the Valencia Community.

The creation of the company was to a great extent the result of Javier F. Urchueguía and Pedro Fernández de Córdoba’s involvement with a European Union research project, GeoCool, a pilot project centred on a wing of the UPV’s Industrial Engineering Faculty building. The project inspired the two researchers to create Energesis in order to offer Spanish society the advantages of geo-thermal energy sources, which is commonplace in countries such as USA, Holland or Germany.

Other projects in the pipeline for Energesis are a centre for natural resources being created by Torrente Town hall and a clinic in Oliva.

www.energesis.es