Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194

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Energy Conversion and Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

Evaluation of the thermal performance of an earth-to-air heat exchanger

(EAHE) in a harmonic thermal environment
Dong Yang ⇑, Yuanhao Guo, Jinpeng Zhang
Key Laboratory of the Three Gorges Reservoir Region’s Eco-Environment, Ministry of Education, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400045, China
National Centre for International Research of Low-carbon and Green Buildings, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400045, China

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

Article history: The earth-to-air heat exchanger (EAHE) is a low-energy device used to improve the thermal condition of
Received 30 July 2015 buildings, which is filled with the air directed from the outside and surrounded by the soil. The temper-
Accepted 24 November 2015 atures of both the air and soil are periodically fluctuating, leading to the EAHEs working in a harmonic
Available online 17 December 2015
thermal environment. However, most of the previous theoretical studies investigated the performance
of EAHEs by ways of static and steady-state models, paying insufficient attention to the temperature
Keywords: phase shifting and fluctuation attenuation effects. The main purpose of this work is to develop an
EAHE
approach to predict the performance of EAHE subjected to harmonic thermal environments. The har-
Harmonic thermal environment
Phase shifting
monic temperature signals transmitted from both the pipe inlet and the ground surface are incorporated
Cooling/heating potential in the model by means of the ‘excess fluctuating temperature’. The amplitude dampening and phase-
Excess fluctuating temperature shifting of the EAHE air temperature for both annually and daily fluctuating cycles are derived as explicit
Analytical solution expressions. The analytical results are validated against numerical simulations. The model is applied in a
hot-summer/cold-winter region. Results indicate that a deep-buried EAHE pipe can reduce the air tem-
perature by 7 °C on a summer day. The maximum cooling or heating capacities occur in spring/summer
or autumn/winter transitional seasons. The use of an EAHE pipe can create a 3000-W cooling or heating
capacity.
Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Mankind constantly pursues a comfortable building environ-
ment. However, energy is essential in the process of maintaining
comfortable indoor building environments. Currently, energy
consumption of buildings accounts for 25–40% of the total energy
consumption, of which, most of the energy is used for heating or
air-conditioning and comes from non-renewable fossil fuels such
as coal, oil and natural gas [1–3]. The requirement for sustainable
development drives people to find alternative, renewable energy to
regulate the indoor thermal environments. Scientists and engi-
neers have undertaken many studies in this area, and in most
cases, solar energy is directly or indirectly used [4–7].
The use of ground as a heat source or sink for passive heating or
cooling of buildings has been used in ancient times [4,8], and this
passive measure has attracted more and more attention in recent
years. The ground receives solar radiation through its surface and
⇑ Corresponding author at: Faculty of Urban Construction and Environmental
Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400045, China. Tel.: +86 23
65120750.
E-mail address: yangdong@cqu.edu.cn (D. Yang).
acts as a large reservoir for solar energy. Because of the thermal
inertia of the soil, the fluctuation amplitude of the soil tempera-
ture, with respect to the ambient air temperature, decreases expo-
nentially as the depth increases. However, the phase shift between
the soil temperature and ambient air temperature increases with
depth. For this reason, at a sufficient depth, the soil is not as cold
as the ambient environment during cold periods and is not as
hot during hot periods [9,10]. These features provide a promising
opportunity for the use of geothermal energy for passive regulation
of building thermal environments. There are two prevalent types of
techniques. One type is the ground source heat pump (GSHP),
which typically includes a heat pump and a ground heat exchanger
sub-system [11,12]. In the heating mode, the GSHP absorbs heat
from the ground and uses it to heat buildings. In the cooling mode,
the thermodynamic process is reversed and the heat is absorbed
from the interior spaces of a building and released to the ground.
GSHP systems have better energy efficiency compared to tradi-
tional air-conditioning and heating systems, leading to continued
growth in applications. Earth-to-air heat exchangers (EAHEs) are
simpler and typically cheaper devices, as also called ground air
tubes or earth-air-tube ventilation systems [4,13–15]. It is
unnecessary to use thermodynamic cycles for the conversion of

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2015.11.050
0196-8904/Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194
Nomenclature
A temperature fluctuation amplitude (K)
A0 temperature fluctuation amplitude combined with
phase shift (K)
Ca specific heat of air (J/kg K)
F a combination of modified Bessel functions
h1 heat transfer coefficient at the pipe inner wall (W/m2 K)
In first kind of modified Bessel functions of order n
Kn second kind of modified Bessel functions of order n
Nu Nusselt number
P fluctuation period (s)
q volume flow rate of ventilation air (m3/s)
Q heating or cooling capacity (W)
QL reduction in heating or cooling load (W)
r radial coordinate (m)
R radius of an EAHE pipe (m)
Re Reynolds number
T temperature (K)
t time (s)
Va velocity of pipe air (m/s)
x pipe length (m)
z burial depth of pipe (m)
Greek symbols
as thermal diffusivity of the soil (m2/s)
~
h excess fluctuating temperature (K)
jg normalized fluctuation amplitude of ground surface
temperature with respect to the outdoor air temperature
geothermal energy in an EAHE, and thus the associated sub-system
is omitted. The ventilation air is drawn through the pipes that are
buried in the soil and exchanges heat with the soil directly. Thus,
the air is pre-cooled in summer and pre-heated in winter before
entering the interior building spaces, which could reduce both
cooling and heating loads of buildings and in turn reduce electric-
ity consumption. EAHEs have been applied in various climates.
They are also applicable for several types of buildings, such as
office buildings [16], commercial buildings [17], residential build-
ings [18] and agricultural greenhouses [15,19]. The combined sys-
tems that integrate EAHEs with other passive techniques, e.g., wind
towers and solar chimneys [2,20], could provide both cooling or
heating capacity and fresh air for the conditioned buildings with
negligible fan energy consumption.
The growth in the applications of EAHEs requires tools for eval-
uating the thermal performance of EAHEs. The performance of
EAHEs depends on various factors such as climate conditions, the
configuration parameters of the pipes (e.g., length and radius),
the buried depth of the pipes, the thermal physical parameters of
the soil, etc. Various papers presented simplified models for pre-
dicting the thermal performance of EAHEs [21–24]. Sulaiman
[22] studied the cooling effect of underground heat pipes theoret-
ically. Malaysia and Kreider [23] calculated the energy perfor-
mance of an underground air tunnel in a steady, periodic state
using an analytical model. A detailed numerical model considering
the effect of the thermal stratification in soil was presented by
Mihalakakou, which was developed inside the TRNSYS simulation
program [24]. Wu et al. [25] developed an implicit model based
on numerical heat transfer and computational fluid dynamics
(CFD) to predict the thermal performance and cooling capacity of
earth-air pipe systems. Al-Ajmi et al. [26] developed a theoretical
model for the outlet air temperature of an EAHE in a hot climate.
Dehghan et al. [27] and Rashidi et al. [28] developed mathematical
models for analyzing the local thermal non-equilibrium condition,
185
jn normalized fluctuation amplitude of pipe air tempera-
ture with respect to outdoor air
ks thermal conductivity of soil (W/m K)
qa air density (kg/m3)
ug phase shift of ground surface temperature with respect
to the outdoor air temperature (rad)
un phase shift of pipe air temperature with respect to out-
door air (rad)
x fluctuating frequency (s1)
Superscripts
— time-averaged value
 time-dependent value
_ Laplace transformation
Subscripts
ini initial condition
g ground surface
n earth-tube air
o outdoor air
r radius coordinate
s soil
y; d values of annual or daily fluctuation period
z depth
heat transfer enhancement effects and pressure drop penalty for
the tube heat exchangers embedded with porous media. However,
most of the previous studies treated the EAHEs by ways of static
and steady-state models, which cannot account for the phase-
shifting effects induced by the transient heat transfer process.
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 temperatures of the soil
surrounding a pipe could also periodically fluctuate with damp-
ened amplitudes and amplified phase shifts. The EAHE perfor-
mance is thus strongly influenced by both the fluctuating
characteristics of the ambient temperature and that of the soil
temperatures. To quantify the contribution of EHAEs to the load
reduction of buildings over the whole annual or daily cycles, it is
necessary to obtain the transient air temperature profiles of the
EAHE outlet. To date, very few studies provided explicit expres-
sions for the phase shift and fluctuation amplitude of the outlet
air temperature of an EAHE pipe. Although the Computational
Fluid Dynamics (CFD) codes combined with numerical heat trans-
fer simulations, such as Fluent, can be used for assisting the design
of EAHEs, the numerical solutions are implicit. In addition, the
computational cost of CFD even becomes unaffordable for simulat-
ing an annual fluctuation cycle. Hollmuller [29] derived analytical
solutions for the heat diffusion of a cylindrical earth-air tube,
which accounts for the periodic fluctuation of ambient air temper-
ature, but his study does not account for the periodic fluctuation of
soil. In Hollmuller’s study, the penetration radius of heat diffusion
inside the soil is specified as a constant. In a recent study, Yang
et al. [30] proposed a method for determining the penetration
radius of soil heat diffusion based on fluctuation frequency [30].
In the study of Yang et al., the effects of pipe air temperature fluc-
tuation are considered, but the soil temperature fluctuation is
excluded, reducing the accuracy for evaluating shallow-buried
pipes.
186 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194

In this paper, an analytical model for the evaluation of the ther-
mal performance of an EAHE in a periodically fluctuating thermal
environment is proposed. Unlike the previous studies, we do not
use a ‘‘penetration radius” to confine the distance of heat diffusion
in soil. Alternatively, the heat diffusion distance in the soil is
assumed to be semi-infinite. Furthermore, we propose using the
‘‘excess fluctuating temperature” to account for the interaction
between the thermal waver originated from the pipe and that pos-
sessed in the soil, making the analysis procedure more straightfor-
ward and efficient. With this procedure, the heating and cooling
capacities of the EAHE system in a fluctuating environment can
be quantified. The model results are compared to a three-
dimensional numerical simulation. The influence of the important
design parameters, such as diameter, pipe length, buried depth and
air flow rate, are then investigated.
2. Mathematical model
2.1. The representation of soil and ambient air temperatures
The fluctuating components of ambient air temperature, pipe
air temperature and the undisturbed soil temperature at the depth
of z are represented as
Te o ¼ Ao eixt
Te n ¼ A0n eixt ¼ An eiðxtun Þ ; A0n ¼ An eiun
Te s;z ¼ A0s;z eixt ¼ As;z eiðxtus;z Þ ; A0s;z ¼ As;z eius;z
respectively.
The temporal profile of the ambient air temperature is repre-
sented as the sum of the time-averaged and harmonic
components:
X T
T o;d ¼ T o;d þ Ao;d eixd td ¼ T o;y þ Ao;m eixm tm
m¼y;d
2.2. The concept of ‘‘excess fluctuating temperature”
When an EAHE pipe intervenes in the soil, the soil tempera-
ture is not only a function of depth and time, but is also affected
by the temperature wave transmitted from the EAHE pipe. The
fluctuating temperature wave originated from the EAHE pipe pen-
etrates into the soil and then changes the temperatures of the soil
around the pipes (as shown in Fig. 1). This phenomenon is rela-
tively obvious in an annually cycle because of the long penetra-
tion time. The effect of the fluctuating temperature wave
originated from an EAHE pipe decays with increasing propagation
distance. At an infinitely large radius, the disturbance effects
induced by the intervention of the EAHE pipes are negligible
and thus the soil temperature approaches the original undis-
turbed soil temperature. Therefore, in the present model, the
boundary condition (i.e., the undisturbed soil temperature) is
imposed at an infinitely large radius rather than at a specified
finite radius. The excess fluctuating temperatures are introduced
here to represent the difference between a certain prescribed
fluctuating temperature and the undisturbed fluctuating soil
temperature:
~hs;r ¼ Te s;r  Te s;z ð7Þ
~hn ¼ Te n  Te s;z ð8Þ
ð1Þ
~ho ¼ Te o  Te s;z ð9Þ
ð2Þ
where un and us;z are the phase shift of the pipe air temperature
ð3Þ and the undisturbed soil temperature at the depth z with respect
to the ambient air temperature, respectively.
Although there remain differences in the undisturbed soil tem-
perature between different radial directions, the undisturbed fluc-
tuating soil temperature at the buried depth of the pipe is used
here. At an infinitely large radius surrounding the EAHE pipe,
e s;z and h
e s;1 ! T ~s;1 ! 0. For the deeply buried EAHE pipes,
ð4Þ e s;z ¼ 0, and thus ~ e n and ~ e s;r .
T hn ¼ T hs;r ¼ T

where m ¼ d corresponds to a daily fluctuation period 2.3. The thermal interaction between EAHE and soil with respect to
(xd ¼ 2p=24h) and t d is the number of hours since the start of a periodically fluctuating thermal environments
daily fluctuation period. The term m ¼ y corresponds to a yearly
fluctuation period (xy ¼ 2p=365d) and t y is the number of days The present model takes both the annual and daily fluctuation
since the start of a yearly fluctuating period. cycles into account. The EAHE pipes are assumed to be cylindrical
The annual and daily profiles of undisturbed soil temperatures (see Fig. 1), and the soil heat conduction equation is represented in
(i.e., those that are not disturbed by the intervention of EAHE a cylindrical coordinate system. The fluctuating component of the
pipes) are equation and the corresponding boundary and initial conditions
are represented by the excess fluctuating temperature as proposed
T s;y ðt y ; zÞ ¼ T s;z;y þ Te s;z;y in Section 2.2:
!
¼ T s;z;y þ Ao;y jg;y @ ~hs ðt; rÞ as @ @ ~hs ðt; rÞ
 rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi   rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi  ¼ r ð10Þ
p 2pt y p @t r @r @r
 exp  z exp i  ug;y  z
as Py Py as Py
ð5Þ @ ~hs
ks j ¼ h1 ð~hn  ~hs ðt; RÞÞ; r ¼ R ð11Þ
@r r¼R
T s;d ðt d ; zÞ ¼ T s;z;d þ Te s;z;d ¼ T s;y ðty ; zÞ þ Te s;z;d
X ~hs ¼ 0; r ¼ 1 ð12Þ
¼ T s;z;y þ Ao;m jg;m
m¼y;d
 rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi   rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi  ~hs ð0; rÞ ¼ 0; t ¼ 0; R < r < 1 ð13Þ
p 2pt m p
 exp  z exp i  ug;m  z The convective heat transfer coefficient at the inner surface of
as Pm Pm as Pm
the EAHE pipe, h1 , is obtained from Appendix A.
ð6Þ
The details for the solution of Eqs. (10)–(13) are shown in
The term z is the depth below ground surface. The terms ug and Appendix B. The complex form for the excess fluctuating tempera-
jg are the phase shift and the normalized fluctuation amplitude of ture of the pipe wall of the EAHE is given as
the ground surface temperature with respect to the outdoor air
~hs ðt; RÞ ¼ ~hn  Fðix; RÞ ð14Þ
temperature, respectively.
 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194 187

Ts , z Tn
Ts , z
θs , r = 0
Tn r →∞
R R r

(a) The cross-sectional view of the EAHE pipe and the variation
of the soil temperature surrounding the pipe

Ground Surface

TR
To z
Tn

(b) The longitudinal view of the EAHE pipe

Fig. 1. Schematic of the heat transfer between an EAHE pipe and the surrounding soil.

where F 0 ðix; RÞ is a combination of modified Bessel functions, as jn ¼ An =Ao ¼ absðA0n Þ=Ao ð18Þ
shown in Appendix B.
Thus, Eq. (14) describes the thermal interaction between the un ¼ ð1Þ  angleðA0n Þ ð19Þ
EAHE pipe and the surrounding soil. In Section 2.3, the analytical
expressions for quantifying the performance of an EAHE system where abs and angle of Eqs. (18) and (19) denote the complex mod-
will be presented. ulus and phase angle, respectively.
The above equations and solutions are applicable to both annual
2.4. Thermal performance of an EAHE and daily cycles. Eq. (17) shows that,

The original form of the heat balance equation of air flow inside  The buried depth, z, has significant effects on both jn and un ;
an EAHE pipe is however, both jn and un are nearly independent of Ao .
@T n @T n  For a deep-buried pipe, A0s;z ! 0, and thus, the outlet air temper-
qa C a pR2 dx ¼ qa C a V a pR2 dx  h1 ðT n  T R Þ2pRdx ð15Þ ature of a deep-buried pipe is
@t @x
The fluctuating component of Eq. (15) is  0

ix þ2d ð1FÞ
A0n ðxÞ ¼ Ao e Va R
x
ð20Þ
R @ Te n @ Te n
¼ R  2d0 ð Te n  Te R Þ ð16Þ
V a @t @x In a year cycle, thermal balance could be achieved between the
where V a is the averaged air velocity over the cross section of the ambient environment and the soil. Therefore, both the yearly aver-
pipe and d0 ¼ h1 =qa C a V a . aged soil temperature, T s;z;y , and the yearly averaged pipe air tem-
The details for the solution of Eq. (16) are shown in Appendix C. perature are approximately equal to the yearly averaged outdoor
The complex form of the fluctuating component of the outlet air air temperature:
temperature is given as T s;z;y  T o;y ð21Þ
0
½Vix þ2dR ð1FÞx
A0n ¼ Ao e a

" ix 2d0
# T n;y  T o;y ð22Þ
V a 2d0 ðF  1Þe½V a þ R ð1FÞx þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ 0
þ As;z ð17Þ Then, the annual profile of air temperature at the pipe outlet of
Rix þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ
an EAHE is
where F ¼ Fðix; RÞ.
T n;y ¼ T n;y þ Te n;y ¼ T o;y þ jn;y Ao;y cosðxy t y  hn;y Þ ð23Þ
Then, the normalized fluctuation amplitude and phase shift of
the tube air temperature with respect to the outdoor air tempera- For a daily fluctuation cycle, the hourly variation in air temper-
ture are given by ature at the pipe outlet of an EAHE is
188 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194

3. Comparison to numerical simulations

The numerical simulations were performed using FLUENT soft-

ware. Only one EAHE pipe, with a length of 60 m, radius of 0.32 m
Ground surface and depth of 4 m, was composed in the soil. The thickness of the
pipe wall is not taken into account, as already assumed in previous
studies [31,32]. The computational domain and the mesh are
EAHE pipe
shown in Fig. 2. The dimensions of the computational domain are
60 m long, 10 m wide and 8 m high. The total number of computa-
tional cells is 986,876. To shorten the simulation time, the period
Velocity inlet
of the fluctuation cycle is set to be much smaller than that of a real
(a) Computational domain annual cycle, which is 1000 s. Conversely, the values of the thermal
diffusivity of the soil were set to be much larger than that of the
real soil to preserve the heat diffusion inside the soil, as shown
in Table 1. The purpose of the simulation was not to reproduce
the transient heat transfer process in the real environment but to
investigate the validity of the proposed approach. Two cases are
taken into account, as shown in Table 1. The soil thermal diffusivity
of Case #1 is larger than that of Case #2, and thus the region
affected by the temperature fluctuation at the ground surface of
Case #1 is deeper than that of Case #2. Case #1 corresponds to a
shallow-buried EAHE pipe, and Case #2 corresponds to a deep-
buried one.
Temporal functions representing the periodic temperature vari-
ations of both ambient air and ground surface are imposed as
(b) Cross-sectional mesh boundary conditions via the user defined functions. The temporal
temperature function at the ground surface was set to be the same
Fig. 2. Computational domain and the cross-sectional mesh.
as that of the pipe inlet. The prescribed temperature functions at
the upper soil surface and at the pipe inlet are defined by (in K):
T n;d ¼ T n;d þ Te n;d T o ¼ T g ¼ 293  12 cosð2pt=1000Þ ð29Þ
 
2p
¼ T o;y þ jn;y Ao;y cos t y  hn;y þ jn;d Ao;d where t is the time in seconds.
365d
  The initial condition for the soil temperature is correlated with
2p the depth z:
 cos t d  hn;d ð24Þ
24h  rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi   rffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi 
p p
For an annual fluctuation cycle, if the fan-raised temperature is T s;z;ini ¼ 293  12 exp  z cos  z ð30Þ
1000as 1000as
exclusive, the temperature difference between the outlet air tem-
perature of an EAHE pipe and the outdoor air temperature is At the inlet of the air pipe, a constant velocity of 0.5 m/s was
imposed. The outlet of the air pipe was prescribed as a pressure
DT no;y ¼ Te n;y  Te o;y ð25Þ outlet. The side boundary surfaces of the computational domain
were set to be adiabatic walls, and the temperature of the bottom
Then, the heating capacity or cooling capacity provided by an
surface was set to be 293 K. A total numerical simulation time of
EAHE pipe is
1000 s, with time steps of 0.01 s, was adopted in the simulations.
Q ¼ C a qa qðT n  T o Þ ð26Þ The turbulent air flow is taken into account by a standard k—e
model. The SIMPLE scheme was used for the pressure–velocity
The reduction in cooling load and that in heating load induced coupling. The calculations were considered converged when the
by the use of an EAHE system are given by residuals for mass, momentum, and energy between two consecu-
tives iterations were lower than 103, 103, and 106, respectively.
Q L;sum ¼ C a qa qðT c;sum  T n Þ ð27Þ Grid sensitivity analysis has been performed through 500-s tran-
sient simulations. Three grid cell densities were used. Results
Q L;win ¼ C a qa qðT n  T c;win Þ ð28Þ demonstrated that the grid system of 986,876 points has enough
resolution, as shown in Fig. 3.
where T c;sum and T c;win are the specified indoor comfortable air Fig. 4 shows the comparisons between the numerical and theo-
temperature of the summers and that of the winters, respectively. retical results. The temporal curves of air temperature at 20 m,

Table 1
Thermo-physical properties of the soil (artificial) and air used for simulations.

Soil property (artificial) Air property

a
Density Thermal conductivity Specific heat Thermal Density Thermal Specific heat Viscosity
(kg/s) (W/m K) (J/kg K) diffusivity (m2/s) (kg/s) conductivity (W/m K) (J/kg K) (kg/m s)
Case#1 0.014 0.0557 0.0242 1.79e5
0.93 1170 1.225 1006
Case#2 0.913 8.7e4
a
Soil density was artificially set for regulating the soil thermal diffusivity.
 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194 189

305 986,876 grid points

Pipe air temperature at 30 m (K)

690,813 grid points

300 1,282,938 grid points

295

290

285

280
(a) Case #1
100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Time (s)

Fig. 3. Simulation results for pipe air temperatures under different grid cell
densities.

30 m and 40 m are used for comparison. Both the fluctuation

amplitudes and phase shifts obtained from the proposed theoreti-
cal approach agree well with the numerical simulation results. The
maximum relative errors between the theoretical and numerical
results for Case #1 and Case #2 are 2.8% and 3.1%, respectively.
The maximum errors occur in the initial periods. The reason could
be that the theoretical mode does not account for the effects of ini-
tial conditions. This agreement indicates that the proposed theo- (b) Case #2
retical approach has a good capability for evaluating the
performance of EAHEs that are subjected to harmonic thermal Fig. 4. Comparisons between the theoretical and numerical simulation results.
environments.
exceeds 7 m. The maximum time lag of outlet air temperature in
4. Parametric studies of the main influential parameters an annual cycle is over 43 days.

In this section, the effects of the main engineering parameters

4.2. The effects of pipe radius
on both the annual and daily profiles of the outlet air temperature
of an EHAE pipe are investigated using the proposed model. In Sec-
In this section, the ventilation flow rate is 0.3 m3/s, and the tube
tion 4.1, the effects of buried depth are investigated. In Sections
length is 60 m. Fig. 6(a) shows that the daily-averaged outlet air
4.2–4.5, for simplicity, the EAHE pipe is assumed to deep-buried,
temperature of the typical summer day initially decreases and then
and thus Eq. (20) is used for calculation. The ambient air tempera-
increases as the pipe radius increases. However, the change in
tures of both an annual cycle and a typical summer day for
daily-averaged temperature is only 0.6 °C when the pipe radius
Chongqing (a hot-summer/cold-winter region of China) are
varies between 0.05 m and 1 m. This indicates that the effect of
employed, as shown in Table 2. The thermo-physical parameters
pipe radius on the daily-averaged outlet air temperature is not
of the soil are shown in Table 3.
obvious. Fig. 6(b) and (c) shows the effects of the pipe radius on
both the phase shift and the normalized fluctuation amplitude of
4.1. The effects of buried depth of the pipe
the outlet air temperature for the typical summer day and the
annual fluctuating cycle, respectively. The phase shift of a daily
The radius of the pipe is set to 0.1 m, the length is 100 m and the
cycle slightly increases at the initial stage and then decreases;
ventilation flow rate is 0.1 m3/s. Fig. 5(a) shows that the increase in
the buried depth of an EAHE pipe generally helps to lower the out-
let air temperature in a typical summer day. The maximum tem- Table 2
perature drop is near 7 °C for a summer day. Fig. 5(b) shows the The climate parameters used for model inputs.
variations of phase shift and normalized fluctuation amplitude of Climate parameters July 30 Annual cycle
outlet air temperature with the buried depth of the pipe in a daily
T o (°C) 31.13 17.84
fluctuation cycle. In a daily fluctuation cycle, the variation trend of Ao (°C) 4.5 10.1
the phase shift is complex when the buried depth is relatively
small; however, the daily phase shift remains constant (i.e.,
3.7 h) when the buried depth exceeds 1 m. The daily fluctuation Table 3
of outlet air temperature decreases with increasing buried depth The soil thermo-physical parameters used for model inputs.
and approaches zero when the buried depth exceeds 1 m, meaning
Soil parameters July 30 Annual cycle
that the soil temperature is nearly stable at such depths in a daily
fluctuation cycle. Fig. 5(c) shows that, in an annual fluctuation Conductivity ks (W/(m K)) 1.1 1.1
Thermal diffusivity as (m2/s) 7.1  107 7.1  107
cycle, the phase shift of the outlet air temperature initially 27.7 17.84
Ground surface temperature T g (°C)
increases and then decreases with the buried depth; however, ug (rad) 0.26 0.02
the annual fluctuation amplitude generally decreases with buried jg ¼ Ag =Ao (dimensionless) 0.71 0.98
depth and approaches a certain value when the buried depth
190 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194

28 24.8
27

Daily-averaged temperature
24.7
Daily-averaged temperature

Daily-averaged temperature Daily-averaged temperature

26 24.6
25 24.5
24
24.4
23
24.3
22
24.2
21
24.1
20
24.0
19 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
R
Buried depth (m)
(a) Daily-averaged outlet air temperature
(a) Daily-averaged outlet air temperature
0.6
2.5
0.5

An/Ao & Phase shift

2.0 An/Ao
An/Ao & Phase shift

0.4
Phase shift An/Ao
1.5 Phase shift
0.3

1.0 0.2

0.1
0.5
0.0
0.0 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 R
Buried depth (m) (b) Daily phase shift and normalized fluctuation
(b) Daily phase shift and normalized fluctuation amplitude of outlet air temperature
amplitude of outlet air temperature
0.76 0.11
1.0 An/Ao Phase shift
0.75 0.10
0.9
0.74 0.09
0.8 An/Ao 0.73 0.08
An/Ao & Phase shift

0.7 Phase shift

Phase shift
An/Ao

0.72 0.07
0.6
0.71 0.06
0.5
0.70 0.05
0.4
0.3 0.69 0.04

0.2 0.68 0.03

0.1 0.67 0.02

0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 R
Buried depth (m) (c) Annual phase shift and normalized fluctuation
(c) Annual phase shift and normalized fluctuation amplitude amplitude of outlet air temperature
of outlet air temperature Fig. 6. The effects of the pipe radius.

Fig. 5. The effects of the buried depth of the pipe.

however, the normalized fluctuation amplitude of the outlet air
temperature shows opposite behavior from the phase shift. In
the annual fluctuation cycle, the phase shift increases initially
and then decreases, and the normalized fluctuation amplitude
shows opposite behavior from the phase shift. The area of the heat
exchange surface increases with the pipe radius. As the pipe radius
further increase, both the pipe air velocity and the associated heat
transfer coefficient decrease. The competition of the two effects
creates the annual fluctuation behavior shown in Fig. 5(c).
indicating that the increase in tube length is favorable to lowering
the outlet air temperature of a hot day. A temperature drop of 5 °C
can be achieved by an EAHE pipe of 200 m. Fig. 7(b) shows that the
phase shift of the outlet air temperature in a daily cycle increases
with the tube length; however, the normalized fluctuation ampli-
tude decreases with the tube length. Fig. 7(c) shows that, in an
annual fluctuation cycle, the increase in tube length has similar
effects. This indicates that the increase in tube length could help
provide a more stable and comfortable thermal environment.

4.3. The effects of pipe length 4.4. The effects of ventilation flow rate

The radius of the tube is 0.5 m, and the ventilation flow rate is The radius of the tube is set to 0.3 m, and the length is 200 m.
0.5 m3/s. Fig. 7(a) shows that the daily-averaged outlet air temper- Fig. 8(a) shows that the daily-averaged outlet air temperature gen-
ature in a typical summer day decreases with the tube length, erally increases with the ventilation flow rate in a typical summer
 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194 191

27 26

Daily-averaged temperature 25
Daily-averaged temperature

Daily-averaged temperature
26
24
25 23
22
24
21
23 20
19 Daily-averaged temperature
22
18
21 17
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2.0
Length q
(a) Daily-averagedoutlet air temperature (a) Daily-averaged outlet air temperature
1.0
0.9 0.6
An/Ao
0.8
An/Ao & Phase shift

Phase shift

An/Ao & Phase shift

0.5
0.7
0.6 0.4
0.5
0.4 0.3
0.3
0.2
0.2
0.1 0.1
An/Ao
Phase shift
0.0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 0.0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2.0
Length
q
(b) Daily phase shift and normalized fluctuation
(b) Daily phase shift and normalized fluctuation
amplitude of outlet air temperature
amplitude of outlet air temperature
1.0
0.7
0.9 An/Ao
An/Ao
0.8 0.6 Phase shift
Phase shift
An/Ao & Phase shift

An/Ao & Phase shift

0.7 0.5
0.6
0.4
0.5
0.4 0.3
0.3
0.2
0.2
0.1 0.1

0.0 0.0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
Length q
(c) Annual phase shift and normalized fluctuation (c) Annual phase shift and normalized fluctuation
amplitude of outlet air temperature amplitude of outlet air temperature
Fig. 7. The effects of the pipe length. Fig. 8. The effects of the flow rate.

day. The phenomena shown in Fig. 8(a) do not mean that the
increase in ventilation flow rate is unfavorable because the cooling
or heating capacity provided by an EAHE is proportional to the pro-
duct of the ventilation flow rate and the air temperature difference
between the pipe inlet and outlet. This occurrence will be further
explained in Section 4.5. Fig. 8(b) shows that the phase shift of
the outlet air temperature in a daily cycle varies non-
monotonically with ventilation flow rate; however, the daily fluc-
tuation amplitude generally increases with increasing ventilation
flow rate. Fig. 8(c) shows that, in an annual cycle, the phase shift
of the outlet air temperature initially increases and then decreases
with ventilation flow rate; however, the annual fluctuation ampli-
tude generally increases with increasing ventilation flow rate, indi-
cating that the increase in ventilation flow rate could be
unfavorable to stabilizing the indoor air temperature.
4.5. Heating and cooling capacities provided by an EAHE
The heating and cooling capacities provided by an EAHE system
in an annual cycle, as defined in Eq. (26), depend on the engineer-
ing parameters referred in Sections 4.1–4.4. However, the effects of
the ventilation flow rate are not straightforward. The heating and
cooling capacities are functions of both the outlet air temperature
and the ventilation flow rate, where the former variable is also
affected by the latter. Therefore, the effects of the ventilation flow
rate on the heating and cooling capacities provided by an EAHE
system are investigated in this section. The pipe length is 100 m,
and the radius is 0.5 m.
As shown in Figs. 9 and 10, although the increase in ventilation
flow rate is unfavorable to both raising the outlet air temperature
192 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194

Temperature difference between outlet and inlet (K) improvement effects induced by an EAHE are attributed mainly
350 6 to the air temperature phase shifting in an annual cycle. The buried
300 4 depth and pipe length are crucial for the outlet air temperature of
Day number

250 2 an EAHE pipe. The improving effects of an EAHE on the air temper-
200 ature are enhanced by an increase of buried depth or pipe length.
0
150 For a typical hot-summer/cold-winter region, a temperature drop
-2
100 of over 5 °C on a summer day can be achieved by a deep-buried
-4
50 EAHE pipe with a length of 200 m. Ventilation flow rate is another
0 -6 important parameter. For a typical hot-summer/cold-winter
0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2
region, the increase of pipe air flow rate results in remarkable
Ventilation flow rate (cubic meter per second)
increase in cooling or heating capacities for the spring/summer
Fig. 9. The variation of temperature difference between the outlet and inlet air with or autumn/winter transitional seasons.
ventilation flow rate in an annual fluctuation cycle.
Acknowledgements

Heating or cooling capacity (W) The authors gratefully acknowledge the support from the
350 3000
National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) under Grant
300 2000
No. 51578087 and the 111 Project (No. B13041).
Day number

250 1000
200 0 Appendix A. Convective heat transfer coefficient at the inner
150 surface of a cylindrical pipe
-1000
100
-2000
50 The convective heat transfer coefficient at the inner surface of a
-3000
0 cylindrical pipe is given by
0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2
Ventilation flow rate (cubic meter per second) h1 ¼ Nu  ka =d ðA1Þ
Fig. 10. The variation of heating or cooling capacity with ventilation flow rate in an where ka is the thermal conductivity of air, d is the diameter of the
annual fluctuation cycle (positive: heating capacity; negative: cooling capacity).
air-tube, and the Reynolds number of the pipe flow is
Re ¼ V a d=ma ðA2Þ
of an EAHE pipe in cold days and lowering it in hot days, it gener-
where ma is the kinematic viscosity of air.
ally increases both the heating capacity in cold days and the cool-
The Nusselt number of a pipe flow is given by Incropera et al.
ing capacity in hot days. For Chongqing, the beneficial effects
[33] as
induced by the increase of ventilation flow rate are notable during
the transitions from springs to summers or from autumns to win- Nu ¼ 4:36 if Re < 2300 ðA3Þ
ters. For example, on the 160th and 350th days, an EAHE pipe com-
bined with a ventilation flow rate of 2 m3/s could decrease the ðf =8ÞðRe  1000ÞPr
Nu ¼ if Re > 2300 ðA4Þ
cooling or heating loads by over 3000 Watts. However, during 1 þ 12:7ðf =8Þ
1=2
ðPr2=3  1Þ
the transitions from winters to springs or from summers to
autumns (e.g., on the 75th and 260th days), the beneficial effects where f is the friction coefficient of the pipe, which is determined
induced by the increase of ventilation flow rate are very small. from Petukhov’s formula [33], expressed as
2
f ¼ ð0:79 ln Re  1:64Þ ðA5Þ
5. Conclusions

This paper provides an analytical approach for evaluating the
performance of the earth-to-air heat exchangers subjected to peri-
odically fluctuating thermal environments. The present model
incorporates the fluctuation effects of both soil temperature and
ambient air temperature; consequently, it is favorable to the eval-
Appendix B. Solution of the fluctuating component of the heat
transfer equation for the soil surrounding a cylindrical pipe
We apply the Laplace transformation in Eqs. (10)–(13) to obtain
_ _

uations of both deep-buried and shallow-buried EAHEs. The ‘ex- @2 h s 1 @ h s s _

þ ¼ hs ðA6Þ
cess fluctuating temperature’ is introduced in the model to @r 2 r @r as
account for the soil temperature variation caused by the interven- _
tion of an EAHE pipe. The fluctuation amplitude attenuation and @ hs _ _
ks j ¼ h1 h n  h s jr¼R ðA7Þ
phase shifting of the air temperature in the EAHE pipe and the @r r¼R
cooling or heating capacities provided by an EAHE are derived as _
explicit solutions, which can be directly applied in the design of h s ðs; 1Þ ¼ 0 ðA8Þ
EAHEs. Because of the accessibility of altering the fluctuation fre-
Combining the initial condition given by Eq. (A8), the general
quency of interest, the explicit solutions can be applicable to both
solution of Eq. (A6) is expressed as a combination of modified Bes-
annually and daily fluctuating cycles. The analytical results are val-
sel functions:
idated with three-dimensional CFD simulations. The present model
_
rffiffiffiffiffi  rffiffiffiffiffi 
costs much less time than a CFD simulation; however, it provides s s
solutions with high accuracy.
h s;r ¼ AI0 r þ BK 0 r ðA9Þ
as as
The effects of the key engineering parameters of EAHEs are
investigated by the proposed model. The use of EAHEs brings where both A and B are determined by boundary conditions.
qffiffiffiffi  qffiffiffiffi 
about fluctuation attenuation and phase shifting effects for air If r ¼ 1, I0 ! 1 as r ! 0, then A ¼ 0 and
s s
as r and K 0
temperatures in both annually and daily fluctuation cycles. The
 D. Yang et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 109 (2016) 184–194 193

rffiffiffiffiffi 
_ s Combining the boundary condition ~
hn jx¼0 ¼ ~ eo  T
ho ¼ T e s;z , the
h s;r ¼ BK 0 r ðA10Þ
as solution of Eq. (A20) is
Combining the other boundary condition, (A7), gives 0
~hn ¼ Te o e½Vixa þ2dR ð1FÞx
rffiffiffiffiffi rffiffiffiffiffi 
 _ rffiffiffiffiffi 
s s s " ix 2d0
#
ks B K1 R ¼ h1 h n  BK 0 R ðA11Þ V a 2d0 ðF  1Þe½V a þ R ð1FÞx  Rix e
as as as þ T s;z ðA21Þ
Rix þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ
Then, B is given as
The expression for the air temperature at the outlet of the EAHE
_ h1
B ¼ hn  qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi ðA12Þ pipe is then given by
as R þ ks as K 1
s s s
h1 K 0 as R 0
Te n ¼ Te o e½V a þ R ð1FÞx
ix 2d

Inserting Eq. (A12) into Eq. (A10), the excess fluctuating tem- " ix 2d0
#
perature of the soil surrounding the EAHE pipe is given as V a 2d0 ðF  1Þe½V a þ R ð1FÞx þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ e
þ T s;z ðA22Þ
qffiffiffiffi Rix þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ
s
_ _ h1 K 0 as r _
h s;r ¼ h n  qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi ¼ h n  Fðs; rÞ ðA13Þ Eq. (A22) can also be expressed as
as R þ ks as K 1
s s s
h1 K 0 as R 0
A0n ¼ Ao e½V a þ R ð1FÞx
ix 2d

where " ix 2d0

#
qffiffiffiffi V a 2d0 ðF  1Þe½V a þ R ð1FÞx þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ 0
þ As;z ðA23Þ
h1 K 0 s
as r Rix þ V a 2d0 ð1  FÞ
Fðs; rÞ ¼ qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi qffiffiffiffi ðA14Þ
as R þ ks as K 1
s s s
h1 K 0 as R
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