Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016

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Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene

An analytical method to evaluate the impact of vertical part of an

earth-air heat exchanger on the whole system
Landry Jean Pierre Gomat a, *, Smae
€l Magloire Elombo Motoula a,
Bernard M’Passi-Mabiala b, c
a
Laboratoire de M
ecanique, Energetique et Ing
enierie, Ecole Nationale Superieure Polytechnique, Universit
e Marien NGouabi, BP 69, Brazzaville, Congo
b
Groupe de Simulations Num eriques en Magn etisme et Catalyse, Facult
e des Sciences et Techniques, Universit
e Marien NGouabi, BP 69, Brazzaville, Congo
c
Unit
e de Recherche en Nanomat eriaux et Nanotechnologies, Institut National de Recherche en Sciences Exactes et Naturelles (IRSEN), Brazzaville, Congo

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper presents a simplified analytical model within numerical results to determine the thermal
Received 31 December 2019 balance of Earth-Air Heat Exchanger (EAHE). The EAHE is a device which uses the principle of soil
Received in revised form thermal inertia used for ventilation in buildings. It has three sections: a vertical section at the entrance,
13 August 2020
an horizontal section in the area of soil thermal inertia and a vertical section at the exit, also considered
Accepted 17 August 2020
Available online 24 August 2020
as area in soil thermal inertia. The assessment for the heat algebrical gain at the vertical section of air
entrance in the EAHE is established. In this study, the initial conditions of the problem are obtained and
the temperature equation specified model is solved analytically, by considering that the vertical part of
Keywords:
Earth-air heat exchanger
an EAHE or a vertical EAHE is under periodic fluctuations in both ambient air temperature and soil
Soil’s thermal inertia temperature. The model can predict the air temperature variation along vertical and horizontal section of
Analytical solution the tube for any hour of the day and can be used for a vertical EAHE. It can also determine the daily or
Initial conditions annualy mean and amplitude of the total cooling or heating effect of the tube. Numerical results are
graphically presented, discussed and compared to experimental datas.
© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction infrastructures consuming energy [4].

Consumption of energy is itself a development issue for coun-
tries with low levels of energy production. In the construction in-
dustry, mechanical and electrical devices (fans, air conditioners,
radiators, etc.) set for interior comfort in buildings consume a
tremendous amount of energy [1] used for air-conditioning, which
runs by burning fossil fuels, however, its high cost and negative
environmental impact makes it necessary to implement passive
systems to reduce the energy consumption [2]. To get to that point,
the mitigation of our dependency on current very pollutant fossil
and nuclear energy is necessary, and the quest to means and
methodologies which optimize the energy production from natural
renewable resources available through solar, soil’s thermal inertia,
geothermal, wind, waves courants, etc [3]. In addition, Researches
are being made to elaborate strategies in order to improve the
comfort (air-conditioning or noise) of buildings and related
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: landry.gomat@umng.cg (L.J.P. Gomat).
The soil temperature is mainly affected by the climatic condition
and soil characteristics of a certain location [5]. Researchers found
that the surface of the earth is heated or cooled at the same time by
the sun, air, wind and rain water so that, the variation of temper-
ature at surface is oscillatory (depending on days and nights
rhythm, and seasons), but the temperature underground doesn’t
undergo the same variation on surface according to the depth. At a
given depth (of 2.5e3 m), the underground soil temperature re-
mains almost constant [6] even if it could still be impacted by local
climate [7] and tends to deviate a lot from the required heat sink or
source temperature of EAHE systems, particularly in winter [7]. On
the ground, hundreds of degrees Celsius could be attained at very
superficial depth and conversely [8]. This thermal gradient depends
on the region of the globe considered [9]. For example, in Bhopal,
Soni et al. [10] found a constant soil temperature at approximately
30
C below 2.7 m depth and in the region of Adrar (Algeria) along
the year, Belatrache et al. [11] reported that the soil temperature
fluctuated between 25 and 28
C at 5 m depth.
Utilization of soil’s thermal inertia for ventilation and cooling of
building is possible by implementing energy exchanges in the soil

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2020.08.084
0960-1481/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1006 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016
Nomenclature
D domain occupied by the air in the tube
Fv dissipation coefficient
Re Reynolds number of air
Pr Prandlt number of air
Nu Nusselt number of air
cp Specific heat of air (J.kg1.K1)
k air inlet thermal conductivity (W.m1.K1)
r air density (kg.m3)
e specific internal energy (J.kg1)
r radiative power heat volume rate (W.m3)
! csol
q total current vector of heat transmitted by
conduction/convection (W.m2)
Uo air outlet velocity (m.s1)
a inner radius of tube (m)
eimp Thickness of the impacted soil zone around the tube
(m)
etube Thickness of tube material (m)
da Annual characteristic depht of soil (m)
with an EAHE. The EAHE is an energy efficient system that can be
used for thermal comfort. The main part of EAHE is a tube put in the
soil to recover the soil’s thermal energy. The EAHE can be defined as
an underground network of tubes which exchange the heat be-
tween the soil and the air inside of the tubes. The air is used as a
fluid transporting the heat, whilst the tubes are used as thermal
exchanger to and channeling the air inside the building.
Various papers presented simplified models for predicting the
thermal performance of an EAHE. In the article entitled An intense
review on the latest advancements of Earth Air Heat Exchangers [13],
Bordoloi et al. has condensed excellent descriptions of previous
analytical and experimental studies on EAHE and their applications,
which one summarizes below.
“EAHE system depends on the ambient temperature of any location
which can be used for both cooling and heating during summer and
winter seasons. During winters, the underground soil temperature
is higher than the ambient temperature and vice versa during
summers [12]” [13].
Coupling an EAHE to a building is an alternative to improve
thermal comfort at low cost, reducing or even replacing the use of
active systems [14] by taking advantage of earth’s undisturbed
temperature or soil’s thermal inertia. In order to take advantage of
EAHE system, it is very important to understand the dynamic heat
transfer effect between the soil, the tube and the air. Yang et al. [15]
have proposed a method to evaluate the dynamic indoor air tem-
perature under the effects of EAHE.
“Ralegaonkar et al. [16] has compared EAHE system with con-
ventional system and concluded that EAHE system saves energy up to
90 percent as compared to conventional systems in Nagpur (India)”
[13].
The EAHE systems to ensure good thermal comfort have a lot of
advantages over the conventional system among which the air as
refrigerant, the low energy consumption with respect to conven-
tional system, the simplicity to design, the maintenance low
expensive, the minimization of pollution by controlling the CO2
emissions [6,13].
“For the continuous flow of air through the inlet certain mechanical
devices such as fans, blowers etc. or passive systems are installed to
create adequate pressure difference” [13]. The heat generated
dj Daily characteristic depht of soil (m)
d depth to bury the EAHE tube (m)
l length of tube (m)
ua Annual pulsation frequency (Hz)
uj Daily pulsation frequency (Hz)
mair air dynamic viscosity (Pa:s or kg.m1 :s-1)
Tðz; tÞ air temperature in the tube (
C)
Tm Annual average of ambient air temperature (
C)
Tmj Daily average of ambient air temperature (
C)
Tsol ðz; tÞ soil temperature (
C)
ksol soil thermal conductivity (W.m1.K1)
rsol soil density (kg.m3)
soil volumetric heat capacity (J. m3.K1)
ktube tube thermal conductivity (W.m1.K 1)
rtube tube density (kg.m3)
ctube tube specific heat (J.kg1.K1)
S ¼ pa2 Cross-sectional area of tube (m2)
hc convection heat transfer coefficient (W.m2 K1)
Hc overall convection heat transfer frequency (Hz)
algebrically by the soil is transferred to the tubes by conduction
which causes the temperature to increases algebrically inside the
buried tubes [17].
The TRNSYS simulation program was used by Mihalakakou et al.
[18] to establish the link between the temperature at the surface of
the soil and the one of the soil in the vicinity of the tubes. His model
has predicted accurately the temperature distribution in the soil
and the temperature of the air flowing through the tubes, thus
determining the overall thermal performance of the EAHE.
“The performance of EAHE depends on the diameter of the pipe,
length of pipe, … Ascione et al. [19] has showed that in wet and humid
soil having a long tube buried to a depth of 3 m, the best performance
of an EAHE system can be achieved.” [13], tube material (“The ma-
terial of the tube should have high thermal conductivity like mild steel,
PVC pipes, cemented pipes etc.” [13,20]), reasonable tube arrange-
ment [20] or others depending on the soil characteristics [13,21]
such as the moisture content [13] and the soil compaction level
[20], the temperature difference between earth and ambient air
(Tittelein et al. [22] has shown by numerical method that the ex-
change of energy through the tube depends on the temperature of
the air flowing in it.), and air flow velocity (in the paper cited above,
Bordoloi et al. [13] reports that Bisoniya et al. [23] has examined the
behaviour of an EAHE system and found that at lower air velocities
and whatever the season, there is high temperature drop. This
observation has been validated using Computational Fluid Dy-
namics -CFD-technology.)
Liu et al. [24] studied a numerical model developed to describe
the simultaneous heat transfer between air and the tube surface by
taking into account the condensation phenomena inside the tube.
Wengang et al. [25] indicates that the depth and length of tube
have great influence on the air outlet temperature and the cooling
or heating capacity. In his study, Wengang et al. compares, using
CFD technology, the building indoor thermal environment under
the action of EAHE system and under natural ventilation condition.
Chlela et al. [26] has made a study on EAHE system which has
established that the position of building and EAHE technology is
the best combination to “meet the indoor thermal comfort and
enhance energy utilization efficiency” [25].
Numerous studies of EAHE system focuse on the only Vertical
Earth-Air Heat Exchanger system (VEAHE system) for the fact that,
compared to conventional EAHE systems, it has smaller land use
 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016
and higher geothermal energy utilization efficiency. Liu et al. [7]
has demonstrated experimentally the feasibility and the effective-
ness of a VEAHE by examining the variation of outlet air temper-
ature, air temperature and the tube soil temperature. The energy
metrics analysis indicates that a VEAHE is economically viable. In
his work, Liu et al. suggest that the VEAHE be designed to reach a
depth of more than 10 m, as the soil temperature under this depth
is more stable and closer to the required cold/heat temperature (e.g.
18e20
C).
In another study, Liu et al. [27] has developed a numerical model
of a novel VEAHE system integrated with annular phase change
material (PCM) validated by experimental datas [28].
Even when the computational cost of CFD becomes unaffordable
to simulate an annual fluctuation cycle of temperature [29], most of
the studies carried out are numerical discretizations. To date, very
few studies provided analytical solutions or explicit expressions for
the phase shift and fluctuation amplitude of the air temperature in
an EAHE. Krarti et al. [30] calculated the energy performance of an
horizontal EAHE in a steady, periodic state using an analytical
model. Hollmuller [31] derived analytical solutions for the heat
diffusion of a cylindrical earth-air tube, which accounts for the
periodic fluctuation of ambient air temperature considering the
penetration radius of heat diffusion inside the soil is specified as a
constant, but his study does not account for the periodic fluctuation
of soil. In a recent study, Yang et al. [29] proposed a method for
determining the penetration radius of soil heat diffusion based on
fluctuation frequency.
Yang et al. [32] proposed an analytical method for evaluating
EAHE thermal performance under periodic fluctuations in both
ambient air temperature and soil temperature but it is an inverse
approach to determine the parameters of EAHE integrating into
buildings such as EAHE geometrical parameters and air flow rate,
based on the prescribed indoor thermal environment regulation
objective.
Furthermore, in this presentation, one focuses on the making a
direct and more precise calculation of the vertical part of EAHE or
the VEAHE submitted to two thermal stresses periodical in time
and damped in space: the temperature of the soil surrounding the
tube (outside the zone of soil’s thermal inertia) undergoes oscilla-
tions around a constant average value like the air entering the tube.
The determination of the initial conditions in the EAHE is the first
important step of the analytical resolution of temperature equation
which is the analytical equation predicting air temperature in the
whole system and represents an instantaneous steady-state energy
balance. The heat transfer flux (convection) and thermal behaviour
of an EAHE expressed by a temperature equation (especially the
heat transfer flux and thermal behaviour of the vertical part which
has not been established at the present time) are established and,
thanks to the initial conditions in an EAHE determined, this tem-
perature equation is solved analytically to simulate the transfer of
energies from soil to air.
Thus, the paper is organized as follow: in Section (2) the physical
model taking into account all conditions and assumptions is pre-
sented. In Section (3) one formulates a constitutive model for the
entire problem and innovative initial condition of this problem. The
analytical solution of the initial conditions is obtained (see Ap-
pendix). The analytical exact solution of the entire problem solved
with the initial conditions solution obtained is determined. To
validate the method, the results obtained with it are compared with
the experimental ones presented in the work of Lin J. [33], for a
simplest case of excitement inside the aera of soil’s thermal inertia.
Those results and the results of the vertical part are given and
graphically presented and discussed in Section (4). The conclusions
are presented in Section (5).
1007
2. Physical model
The open-loop EAHE system [34] considered in this paper is
shown in Fig. 1. It has three parts: a vertical part at the entrance, an
horizontal part in the area of soil’s thermal inertia and an another
vertical part at the exit, also considered in the area of soil’s thermal
! ! !
inertia. Let be: ( e x ; e y ; e z ) a galilean unit orthogonal cartesian
! ! !
frame such as shown in Fig. 1, ( e r ; e q ; e z ) the galilean unit
orthogonal cylindrical frame connected to the vertical part of an
! ! !
EAHE and ( e r ; e 4 ; e y ) the galilean unit orthogonal cylindrical
frame connected to the horizontal part of an EAHE. To quantify the
performance of an EHAE to over the whole annual or daily cycles, it
is necessary to obtain the transient air temperature profiles of the
EAHE outlet. The EAHE performance is thus strongly influenced by
both the characteristics of the ambient temperature and that of the
soil temperatures. However, the ambient air temperature, as the
inlet air temperature of an open-loop EAHE, periodically fluctuates
throughout both annual and daily cycles. Meanwhile, the temper-
atures of the soil surrounding a tube could also periodically fluc-
tuate with dampened amplitudes and amplified phase shifts.
The model of soil temperature considered is done by Lin J. [33]
assuming the following considerations: energy transfer is one-
dimensional, soil is homogeneous (continuous, rigid and semi-
infinite media), temperature in soil is unsteady outside the zone
of soil’s thermal inertia, remains constant after a given depth (in-
side the zone of soil’s thermal inertia) and reaches the outdoors
annual average temperature. The soil temperature is estimated by
the following transient heat conduction equation [33]. In the rep-
resentation of the problem, one has:
vTsol ðz; tÞ v2 Tsol ðz; tÞ
¼ csol (1)
vt vz2
where Tsol ðz; tÞ is the soil temperature, csol the soil thermal diffu-
ksol
sivity which is calculated by csol ¼ csol , ksol the soil thermal con-
ductivity, csol the soil specific heat and z is the depth below ground
surface.
The soil temperature taken from statistics as a seasonal soil
temperature variation depending on the environmental tempera-
ture (heat transfer from air to soil). The work of Thiers et al. [35],
like of many other authors, has shown that, in general, even when
the excitation of the ground by the periodic solar radiation, ambient
air, geothermal flow or the influence of a building close the soil aera
under consideration, the time-dependent temperature of the soil
surface is annually and daily periodic on the ground surface so that
the form of its expression is almost the same such as:
Tsol ð0; tÞ ¼ Tsur þ Asur sinðut þ fsur Þ (2)
where Tsur and Asur are the periodical average of temperature and
periodically amplitude of the soil surface temperature wave and
fsur is phase shift.
But in this paper, one considers the results obtained by J. Lin
et al. in work [33] were the influence of seasonal radiative solar
heating of the soil, geothermal flow or the influence of a building
close the soil aera under consideration is not taken into account.
The temperature signal applied on the soil surface is then given by:
Tsol ð0; tÞ ¼ Tm þ Ao sinðua t þ fo Þ þ ½Am þ A1 sinðua t þ f1 Þ

 (3)
sin uj t þ f2
By using the expression (3), the unsteady heat conduction in the
soil (inertia and scattering) expressed by equation (1) gives:
1008 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016

Fig. 1. Schematic view of a building combined with an open-loop earth-air heat exchanger.

Fig. 2. Thermal exchange schema of the segment dz of the EAHE.

 
z
Tsol ðz; tÞ ¼ Tm þ Ao eda sin ua t  þ fo
z

da
!
dz z
þ ½Am þ A1 sinðua t þ f1 Þe j sin uj t  þ f2 Fig. 3. Cross-sectional view of the EAHE tube considered.
dj
(4) the subsoil corresponds to a given average soil temperature. For the
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi tube, the following considerations are taken into account: the tube
2csol 2csol
where dj ¼ uj and da ¼ ua . Fluctuations in atmospheric is modeled as a cylindrical tube collector of given cross section area
temperatures are damped exponentially in the subsoil. This de- submitted to a variable thermal sollicitation, through which a fluid
termines the property of thermal inertia of the soil: the subsoil (i.e. the air) flows with a constant and uniform velocity Uo.
temperature is almost constant at a given depth. Condensation and evaporation inside of the tube are not taken into
The assumption of infinite depth ( lim Tsol ðz; tÞ ¼ Tm ) can be account, convective heat transfer coefficient hc is constant along
z/þ∞
the tube.
replaced by the finite one, large with respect da , but low enough so Let D be domain occupied by the air that one follows in its
that additional phenomena of warming (such as geothermal en- motion in the tube of EAHE. The physical properties of air are
ergy) does not occur: represented by its mass mðD; tÞ which is defined by:

lim Tsol ðz; tÞ ¼ Tm (5) ð

z/d
mðD; tÞ ¼ r dv (6)
where Tm is the annual average of soil temperature at the buried D
depth of the EAHE tube. Equation (5) shows that the penetration
period of the variations temperature of the surface at given depth of where r (kg/m3) is mass density, dv (m3) the elementary volume of
 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016 1009

neglected (Fv ¼ 0) and no heat source are present (r ¼ 0) in the air.

Denoting the overall convection heat transfer frequency by:

2 hc
Hc ¼
  (11)
aþetube þeimp
a r cp 1 þ ahc k 1 ln aþeatube þ k1 ln aþe tube
tube sol

and assuming that the air has constant density r and constant
specific heat cp , it comes that the energy balance (given by equation
(8)) of the air in an EAHE can be represented by the temperature
equation below:

vTðz; tÞ vTðz; tÞ vTsol

Uo þ þ Hc Tðz; tÞ ¼ Hc Tsol ðz; tÞ þ Hc Q ðz; tÞ
vz vt vt
ðz; tÞ2ð0; ∞Þ  ð0; þ∞Þ
(12)

with


etube ð2a þ etube Þ eimp 2a þ 2etube þ eimp
Q¼  þ
4ctube 4csol
a2 a þ etube ða þ etube Þ2 a þ etube þ eimp
Fig. 4. Schematic view of a vertical part of an EAHE tube and the surrounding soil. þ ln þ ln þ
2ctube a 2csol a þ etube
k e ða þ etube Þ a þ etube þ eimp
D (see Fig. 2).  tube tube ln (13)
ksol 2ctube a þ etube
Let cp (J/(kg.K)) be the specific heat at constant pressure, e (J/kg )
!
the specific internal energy, k (J.m/K) the thermal conductivity, q where a is the inner radius of tube, etube the thickness of the tube
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
the total current vector of heat transmitted by conduction/con- csol
material, eimp ¼ 2u ¼ dj the thickness of impacted soil zone
vection, r the radiative power heat volume rate and Fv the dissi- j

pation coefficient. around the tube.

According to the mass conservation law: For an EAHE, the convective heat transfer coefficient hc between
the airflow and the tube is one of the most important parameters
dm [18,36]. It indicates in a macroscopic way, thermal transfer that
¼0 (7) takes place between the air flow and the boundary layer on the tube
dt
internal surface. In general, this coefficient depends as much on the
the conservation law of energy: problem geometry studied as on intrinsic factors (viscosity, density
or thermal conductivity) of air or of tube (roughness for example)
ð ð ð
r e dv ¼ rdv  div !
d [37]. In particular, for the same type of geometry (in this case an
q dv þ Fv (8)
dt internal flow in a cylindrical tube) but for different fluids, the
D D D convective heat transfer coefficient hc (which is constant
throughout the tube, that is to say not depending on the longitu-
the Fourier’s law:
dinal evolution of air temperature but all at more dependent on the
! speed of the flow) is generally expressed by reducing it relative to
!
q ¼  k grad TðtÞ (9) conduction transfer coefficient, calculated for an air thickness
equivalent to the diameter of the tube 2a [30].
The ambient temperature taken from statistics as a daily tem-
Considering k as the thermal conductivity of air, mair the air
perature variation depending on the environmental temperature is
dynamic viscosity, a the radius of the air-tube, the Nusselt number
given by:
(Nu) of a tube flow is given by Lin J. et al. [33] such as:



Text ðtÞ ¼ Tmj þ Bo  B1 sin uj t þ 41 sin uj t þ 4o (10)
Re Pr f
Nu ¼
 (14)
where Tmj , Bo and B1 are the daily average of temperature and daily 8 þ 25:4ð2 f Þ0:5 Pr 0:67  1
amplitude of air temperature wave, uj (Hz) is the daily pulsation
frequency and 4o and 41 are phases shift. As done by Yang et al. in paper [38], the friction coefficient of the
Considering that longitudinal heat diffusion is not taken into tube f is determined from Petukhov’s formula expressed such as:
account because for air, the Peclet number Pe is large [30] so that
! !
diffusion current is negligible compared to convection one: q ¼ qc f ¼ ð0:79 ln Re  1:64Þ2 (15)
(longitudinal heat diffusion is secondary to lateral diffusion);
temperature of air in the tube is given by Tðz; tÞ as EAHE is thin The convection heat transfer coefficient is given by:
elongated form that can be approximated by a linear shape func-
tion, main attention is on both the radial heat transfer and the axial Nu:k
! ! ! hc ¼ (16)
effects (see Fig. 3 and Fig. 4), z is the axial position ( e z ¼ e x ∧ e y ¼ 2a
! !
e r ∧ e q ) and t denotes the time; effect of the air viscosity is The Reynolds number (Re) of the air inside the tubes is:
1010 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016

2a vffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
Re ¼ r:Uo : u
(17) uðR þ ua QSÞ2 þ u2j Q 2 R2
mair X2 ¼ Hc u
u !2 !2 (26)
u
The Prandlt number (Pr) is expressed as: t
Hc  Udo þ Udo
j j

mair cp
Pr ¼ (18)
k  
Hc  Ud o ðsinfo þ ua Q cosfo Þ þ Ud o ðcosfo  ua Q sinfo Þ
a a
f3 ¼ arctan  
Hc  d ðcosfo  ua Q sinfo Þ  d ðsinfo þ ua Q cosfo Þ
Uo Uo
3. Air temperature solution in the tubes a a

(27)
The cavity of a tube is occupied by the air at the temperature

!



Hc  d ðR þ ua QSÞsinf2 þ uj QRcosf2 þ Udo ðR þ ua QSÞcosf2  uj QRsinf2
Uo
j j

f4 ¼ arctan ! (28)



Uo
Hc  d ðR þ ua QSÞcosf2  uj QRsinf2  Udo ðR þ ua QSÞsinf2 þ uj QRcosf2
j j

Tðz; tÞ that will carry the heat. It travels the EAHE to be cooled or
warmed by the soil in which it is buried. The air undergoes a forced
flow at the velocity Uo with heat transfers given by following with R ¼ Am þ A1 sinf1 and S ¼ A1 cosf1 .
temperature equation: By taking into account the boundaries conditions and initial
For conditions of the problem, one assumes the solution of equation
(19) in the form:
ðz; tÞ2ð0; dÞ  ð0; þ∞Þ
Tðz; tÞ ¼ a1 ðtÞ þ a2 ðtÞ gðzÞ (29)
vTðz; tÞ vTðz; tÞ vTsol
Uo þ þ Hc Tðz; tÞ ¼ Hc Tsol ðz; tÞ þ Hc Q ðz; tÞ
vz vt vt in which a1 ðtÞ and a2 ðtÞ are time dependent functions yet to be
(19) determined. To determine these functions, solution (29) matches
The boundaries conditions of the problem are given by: the boundaries conditions (20), (21). Hence, one writes:



 a1 ðtÞ þ a2 ðtÞ Text ð0Þ ¼ Text ðtÞ (30)

Tð0; tÞ ¼ Tmj þ Bo  B1 sin uj t þ 41 sin uj t þ 4o (20)
a1 ðtÞ þ a2 ðtÞ Tm ¼ Tm (31)
Tðd; tÞ ¼ Tm (21)
One obtains:
The initial conditions built of the problem are given by:
Text ðtÞ  Text ð0Þ Tm  Text ðtÞ
Tðz; tÞ ¼ Tm þ gðzÞ (32)
  Tm  Text ð0Þ Tm  Text ð0Þ
UHoc z dza z
Tðz; 0Þ ¼ Tm þ Xo e þ X1 e sin f3 
da Inside the zone of soil’s thermal inertia (see Fig. 5) corre-
! (22) vTsol
dz z sponding of the case vt ðy; tÞ ¼ 0 using the same analytical
þ X2 e j sin f4  method, one obtains:
dj
Hc
Tðy; tÞ ¼ Tm þ ½Tðz ¼ d; tÞ  Tm  eUo y (33)
vTðz; 0Þ
¼ 0; z2ð0; dÞ (23)
vt Text ðtÞ  Tm Hc
Tðy; tÞ ¼ Tm þ ½gðdÞ  Tm  eUo y (34)
Text ð0Þ  Tm
where
where Tm is the soil temperature inside the zone of soil’s thermal
Xo ¼ Tmj  Tm þ ðBo  B1 sin41 Þ sin4o  X1 sinf3  X2 sinf4 inertia (corresponding at the average buried depth of the exchanger
(24) tubes). It is also the average initial temperature inside the tube.
equation (33) is exactly the same obtained by J. Lin et al. in work
vffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi [33] substituting Tðz ¼ d; tÞ by Text ðtÞ.
u
u 1 þ u2a Q 2
X1 ¼ Hc Ao u
u 2  2 (25)
t 4. Numerical results and discussion
Hc  Ud o þ Ud o
a a

To simulate the EAHE system studied, the analytical solution has

been computed in Wolfram Mathematica computation software.
 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016
Fig. 5. Schematic view of an horizontal part of an EAHE tube and the surrounding soil.
The input parameters used for calculation are given in Ref. [33]. The
model consists of a quasy-steady state of the system and it was
considered that there is a zone surrounding the tube where the soil
temperature is disturbed by the thermal exchange; the air flow
inside the tube remains turbulent to assure the forced convection.
At first, the initial soil temperature distributed was considered,
then initial air temperature inside the buried tube (along the tube)
was assumed verifying the temperature equation written for t ¼
cte ¼ 0. The air temperature of the EAHE was calculated for the
whole system (vertical and horizontal parts) by using the proposed
analytical model presented in this paper in which the determina-
tion of the initial air temperature in the tube is the main step of the
method. By taking into account the variation of soil temperature
surrounding the tube (the temperature of the soil surrounding the
vertical tube undergoes oscillations in time and space around a
constant average value Tm as the external air temperature inlet the
tube undergoes oscillations in time around a constant average
value Tmj ), an analytical equations predicting the air temperature in
the vertical tube and the horizontal one are established and solved
analytically to simulate the heat transfer from soil to air. Analytical
results points out the influence of the soil temperature on the EAHE
tube depending on whether the soil inertia temperature is
considered constant or fluctuating around an average value. The
coefficient Q presents the influences of thicknesses of the tube and
the impacted soil surrounding the tube, and shows that, even if the
tube thickness is neglected, the impacted zone must always be
considered.
A single-layered soil was considered in the numerical simula-
tions. The cooling exchangers of the EAHE was computed for the
december 1, 2016 in Strasbourg at University of Strasbourg by using
the constant velocity Uo ¼ 0:51m. s1, and ambient air tempera-
ture. The temperature outing the EAHE was calculated from each
measured air temperature that had been previously recorded every
20 min. In order to show the relevant physical aspects of the
analytical method, one plots several graphs for analytical solution
of temperature equation (19) and the experimental results recor-
ded by J. Lin et al. in work [33]. One presents now some graphs of
the temperature profiles and temperature decrement that show the
effects of the parameters on the behaviour of the EAHE in term of
heat transfer for the case vTsol
ðy; tÞ ¼ 0 corresponding to an hori-
vt
zontal part of the EAHE (see Fig. 5) and the case vTvtsol ðy; tÞs 0 cor-
responding to the vertical part of the EAHE (see Fig. 4).
The graphs in Fig. 6 show the comparison between the analyt-
ical method solution and the recorded datas. The results show a
good agreement between the analytical predictions and the
experimental results, with an average temperature difference of
1.18
C. A good temperature prediction with the initial conditions
1011
implemented is obtained. The differences noticed between the
experimental results and the theoretical model could be due to the
fact that:
 one does not take into account the latent heat of phase change of
the Condensation in winter and Evaporation in summer inside
the tube;
 one considered a soil with an unique layer; whilst the data
recorded have been done on a soil with multiple layers (sand,
vegetation and natural soil with variable moisture).
The results confirm (as it is shown in Fig. 6) the warmer in
winter (or the cooler in summer) ability of the EAHE to add (or
reduce) the external air temperature flowing into the EAHE system
[30,39]. This can be interpreted by the fact that the tube of the
EAHE provides path over by increasing the exchange surface area
and increases the heat transfer rate between the flowing air and the
tube. It is well known that external air temperature fluctuations
desappear in the soil after a small depth (property of thermal
inertia of the soil) [30,39], but for inlet air temperature of the EAHE,
the graphs of Fig. 6 show also that these fluctuations desappear
only after a great depth.
The graphs in Fig. 7 show that the inlet air temperature in the
horizontal part is not exactly the ambient air temperature. The
vertical part of the EAHE on the length of z ¼ d ¼ 1:03 m changes
the temperature of the air of around 0  j△Tj  0:91o C before the
air enters in the horizontal part. The vertical part of an EAHE can
improve the outlet temperature by an algebrically gain of 1:2o C.
The EAHE had a more important contribution for the very low
temperature than for high one. As can be seen in Fig. 7, when the
external temperature is very low (from 0 s to 30 000 s) △T is
greater (the EAHE highly increased the temperature) than when the
external temperature is more high.
5. Conclusion and outlook
In the present paper, steady state one-dimensional vertical
EAHE was developed for evaluating the impact of vertical EAHE
performance which is submitted to a periodical in time and dam-
ped in space thermal soil sollicitation. The EAHE is used as passive
cooling system for buildings. By using external ambient air tem-
perature simulated, the evolution of air temperature in a vertical
tube and a horizontal tube of an EAHE was estimated.
The envisaged study allowed to obtain:
 An analytical model of an EAHE by determining the initial
condition to determine the air temperature along the tube, and
most importantly at the outlet of the exchanger: without using
the electrical analogy to obtain temperature equation, taking
into account the variability of soil temperature surrounding the
tube (the temperature of the soil surrounding the tube un-
dergoes oscillations in time and space around a constant
average value as the external air temperature inlet the tube
undergoes oscillations in time around a constant average value
Tm ) and the variability of the external air temperature inlet the
tube (the temperature of the air entering inside the tube un-
dergoes oscillations in time around a constant average value
Tmj );
 The fundamental analytical results, such as the equation of the
temperature of the air flowing in the whole exchanger, which
displays a term representing the variation in soil temperature
through the time as a result of Q coefficient function of physical
characteristics of the area surrounding the tube impacted by
heat exchanges between the soil and the tube. That equation is
usually a function of soil temperature but not of its time
1012 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016

Fig. 6. Comparisons of model-predicted air temperature of EAHE with measured datas.

derivatives. Those analytical results point out the influence of
the soil temperature on the EAHE tube according to soil inertia
temperature is considered constant or fluctuating around an
average value;
 An analytical equation predicting the air temperature in the
vertical part of the EAHE is established and solved analytically to
simulate the heat transfer from soil to air;
 An analytical equation predicting the air temperature in the
horizontal part of the EAHE deduced from that of the vertical
part and solved analytically to simulate the heat transfer from
the ground to the air;
 The initial conditions in a vertical and horizontal part of the
EAHE;
 Outlet temperatures from numerical simulation compared with
the experimental data recorded in University of Strasbourg and
presented in the work [33];
 The variation in temperature caused only by the vertical part of
the entry of the EAHE thus showing that the vertical portion has
a significant impact in the thermal performance of the
exchanger even if the bury depth is short.
 An analytical model to determine the air temperature solution
of the vertical earth to air heat exchanger (VEAHE).
The results obtained show that the vertical part of an EAHE for
heating (or cooling) buildings has a significant impact in the ther-
mal performance of the exchanger even if the bury depth is short,
and makes the whole EAHE more efficient, justifying therefore the
use of a vertical EAHE for the same objectives as those of horizontal
exchangers. To consider that at the entrance to the horizontal part
of the exchanger the air temperature is that of the ambient air in-
troduces a loss of information on the temperature variation of the
order of at least one degree over less than 2 m depth. The estab-
lished model makes it possible to predict the temperatures inside
and at the outlet of the exchanger throughout the year, over a long
or short period; therefore, the ambient air temperature is modeled
during this period.
The deficiency of this paper lies in the non taking into account
the condensation and evaporation inside the tube. For future
works, the condensation and evaporation must be incorporated.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Landry Jean Pierre Gomat: Conceptualization, Investigation,
€l Magloire Elombo
Methodology, Writing - review & editing. Smae
Motoula: Investigation, Software, Writing - original draft. Bernard

Fig. 7. Ambient air temperature versus air temperature at the entrance of horizontal part (or at the exit of vertical part) of the EAHE.
 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016 1013

M’Passi-Mabiala: Supervision.
Tðd; tÞ ¼ Tm (37)
The initial condition is built such as:

Declaration of competing interest vTðz; 0Þ

Tðz; 0Þ ¼ gðzÞ; ¼ 0; z2ð0; dÞ (38)
vt
The authors declare that they have no known competing
financial interests or personal relationships that could have gðzÞ is a function yet to be determined, verifying equation (39)
appeared to influence the work reported in this paper. below:

   
dgðzÞ z z
þ Hc gðzÞ ¼ Hc Tm þ Hc Ao eda sin fo 
z
Uo þ Q ua cos fo  þ
dz da da
" " ! !# !#
z z z z
þHc e dj ðAm þ A1 sinf1 Þ sin f2  þ Q uj cos f2  þ Q ua A1 cosf1 sin f2  (39)
dj dj dj

Acknowledgements
Professor Bernard M’Passi-Mabiala thanks the Abdus Salam
International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) through the
associated program. He is grateful to the Royal Society - DFID
Africa Capacity Building Initiative grant by African Clean Energy
Research Alliance (ACERA). The authors thank Dr Jian Lin of
ICUBE - Laboratoire des sciences de l’ingenieur, de l’informatique
et de l’imagerie- in the GCE -Genie Civil et Energe
tique- team by
providing them with experimental datas, and Romuald Louyin-
doula Mayamona for his notes after to read the manuscript.
Appendix
Determination of initial condition in the tube
The solution of equation (Determination of initial condition in
the tube.) must satisfy the boundaries conditions:
gð0Þ ¼ Tð0; 0Þ ¼ Text ð0Þ ¼ Tmj þ ðBo  B1 sin41 Þ sin4o (40)
and
gðdÞ ¼ Tðd; 0Þ ¼ Tm (41)
Equation (41) gives a way to estimate the annual average soil
temperature at the buried depth. According to the principle of su-
perposition, the solution of equation (Determination of initial
condition in the tube.) can be obtained separately and combined
linearly:

The cavity of a tube is occupied by the air at the temperature

Tðz; tÞ that will carry the heat. It travels the EAHE to be cooled or gðzÞ ¼ gh ðzÞ þ gp ðzÞ (42)
warmed by the soil in which it is buried. The air undergoes a forced
gh ðzÞ is the response to the boundary condition gð0Þ:
flow at the velocity Uo with heat transfers given by following
temperature equation: For
dgh ðzÞ Hc

ðz; tÞ2ð0; dÞ  ð0; þ∞Þ Uo þ Hc gh ðzÞ ¼ 00gh ðzÞ ¼ Xo eUo z (43)

dz
vTðz; tÞ vTðz; tÞ vTsol
Uo þ þ Hc Tðz; tÞ ¼ Hc Tsol ðz; tÞ þ Hc Q ðz; tÞ gp ðzÞ is the response to the applied temperature constraint f ðz; 0Þ,
vz vt vt
(35)

   
z z
f ðz; 0Þ ¼ Hc Tm þ Hc Ao eda sin fo 
z
þ Q ua cos fo  þ
da da
" " ! !# !#
dz z z z
þHc e j ðAm þ A1 sinf1 Þ sin f2  þ Q uj cos f2  þ Q ua A1 cosf1 sin f2  (44)
dj dj dj

The boundaries conditions of the problem are given by:




Tð0; tÞ ¼ Tmj þ Bo  B1 sin uj t þ 41 sin uj t þ 4o (36)
1014 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016

" ! !#
Uo X2 dzj z z
 e sin f3  þ cos f3  þ þHc Tm
dj dj dj
  !
dgp ðzÞ z dz z
þ Hc X1 eda sin f3 
z
Uo þ Hc gp ðzÞ ¼ f ðz; 0Þ (45) þ Hc X 2 e j sin f4 
dz da dj
One assumes the solution of equation (45) in the same form as ¼
f ðz; 0Þ as follow
   
z z
¼ Hc Tm þ Hc Ao eda sin fo 
z
þ Q ua cos fo 
da da
" " !
 z
z
! þ þHc e dj ðAm þ A1 sinf1 Þ sin f2  þ Q uj cos f2
  dj
dza z dz z !# !#
gp ðzÞ ¼ Tm þ X1 e sin f3  þ X2 e sin f4 
j (46)
da dj z z
 þ Q ua A1 cosf1 sin f2 
dj dj
in which X1 , X2 , f3 and f4 are constants yet to be determined.
(47)
Inserting equation (46) into equation (45), one obtains:
Equation (47) can be satisfied provided the coefficients of eda
z

dz
and e , on both sides of the equation are equal, and the same can
j






    be said about the coefficients of sin dz , cos dz , sin dz and cos dz ,
Uo X1 dz z z a a j j

 e a sin f3  þ cos f3 
da da da which yield five algebraic equations in Tm , X1 , X2 , f3 and f4 as
follow:

 
Uo Uo
Hc  X1 cosf3 þ X1 sinf3 ¼ Hc Ao cosfo  Hc Ao Q ua sinfo (48)
da da

 
Uo Uo
 X1 cosf3 þ Hc  X1 sinf3 ¼ Hc Ao sinfo þ Hc Ao Q ua cosfo (49)
da da

!
Uo Uo
Hc  X2 cosf4 þ X2 sinf4 ¼ Hc ½ðAm þ A1 sinf1 Þ þ A1 Q ua cosf1 cosf2 þ
dj dj
Hc ðAm þ A1 sinf1 Þ Q uj sinf2 (50)
 L.J.P. Gomat et al. / Renewable Energy 162 (2020) 1005e1016 1015

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