Aquifer thermal energy storage for decarbonisation of heating and cooling: Overcoming technical, economic and societal barriers to UK deployment

用于供热和制冷脱碳的含水层热能存储：克服英国部署的技术、经济和社会障碍

• 批准号: EP/V041878/1
• 负责人: Matthew Jackson
• 金额: $ 194.28万
• 依托单位: Imperial College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2021 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FV041878%2F1
• 关键词: Aquifer; thermal; energy; storage; decarbonisation

The UK uses around 50 GW of energy to heat and cool buildings, only 6% of which comes from renewable sources. Reducing building sector emissions is an essential part of the UK's decarbonisation strategy for achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050. However, heat is challenging to decarbonise due to its extreme seasonality. Daily heat demand ranges from around 15 to 150 GW, so new technologies with inter-seasonal storage are essential.Heating buildings in winter and cooling them in summer produces waste heat or cool that is currently lost. We propose a technology to instead store this and re-use when required, by warming or cooling groundwater that is pumped underground and stored in an aquifer (porous rock mass). In summer, warm water is stored to provide heating in winter; in winter, cool water is stored to provide cooling in summer. This technology is termed aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES) and has been widely applied in other countries, notably the Netherlands where there are over 2500 ATES installations. These have shown that the technology is highly efficient, recycling up to 90% of the energy that would otherwise be wasted. ATES can be deployed with renewable electricity sources, storing excess output to help ease the challenges of integrating >40 GW of intermittent offshore wind energy.The UK has only a handful of projects, mainly located in London and supplying less than 0.025% of UK demand. Yet it has high potential for ATES: there are seasonal variations in temperature and widespread aquifers where heat and cool can be stored. Moreover, there is increasing demand for cooling as well as heating, as summers become hotter and longer.Experience in other countries has shown that widespread deployment of ATES can be prevented by technical, economic and societal barriers, such as uncertainty in the response of aquifers to energy storage, a lack of knowledge of the economic value and decarbonisation potential of the technology, and lack of public understanding or acceptance. This project brings together geoscientists, geoengineers, economists and social scientists to address key barriers to deployment of ATES in the UK, proposing solutions that inform government policy, the regulatory framework, planning authorities, and energy and infrastructure companies. The project integrates four key strands, combining technical geoscience and geoengineering research with economics and social science research. This integrated approach is essential to address deployment barriers. Our overall goal is to deliver solutions and recommendations that facilitate an increase the capacity of ATES in the UK to several GW (a thousand-fold increase on current capacity) with projects widely deployed across the UK. Our research will determine the UK capacity for ATES, linking supply and demand and creating maps for policy makers and planners. We will understand how a key UK aquifer responds to ATES by conducting field trials and laboratory experiments. We will identify strategies to deploy and operate ATES systems that maximize storage capacity and efficiency, while accounting for uncertainties in aquifer behaviour that are inevitable when engineering natural systems.Our economic research will quantify the economic value of ATES, accounting for the lifecycle costs of installation and operation, and the added value that ATES can deliver to the wider energy system storing excess renewable energy from wind and solar in times of low demand. We will quantify the decarbonisation potential of ATES in a lifecycle context, so it can be objectively compared against other low carbon heating and cooling options. Our social science research will ensure responsible deployment of ATES, promoting the co-design of ATES projects in line with societal priorities and values. It will use international examples to identify best practice, and identify and quantify broader societal benefits, such as the potential to develop a demand for skilled jobs.

英国使用约 50 吉瓦的能源来为建筑物供暖和制冷，其中只有 6% 来自可再生能源。减少建筑行业排放是英国到 2050 年实现净零碳排放的脱碳战略的重要组成部分。然而，由于供热的极端季节性，脱碳面临着挑战。每日热量需求范围约为 15 至 150 吉瓦，因此具有跨季节存储的新技术至关重要。冬季为建筑物供暖，夏季为建筑物制冷，会产生目前已损失的余热或冷量。我们提出了一种技术，通过加热或冷却抽取到地下并储存在含水层（多孔岩体）中的地下水来储存这些水并在需要时重复使用。夏季储存温水，冬季供暖；冬季储存冷水以供夏季降温。这项技术被称为含水层热能储存（ATES），并已在其他国家广泛应用，特别是荷兰，该国拥有超过 2500 个 ATES 装置。这些表明该技术非常高效，可回收高达 90% 的能源，否则这些能源将被浪费。 ATES 可以与可再生电力一起部署，存储多余的输出，以帮助缓解整合 > 40 GW 间歇性海上风能的挑战。英国只有少数项目，主要位于伦敦，供应不到英国需求的 0.025% 。然而，它在ATES方面具有很大的潜力：温度存在季节性变化，并且含水层广泛，可以储存热量和冷量。此外，随着夏季变得更热、时间更长，对制冷和供暖的需求也在不断增加。其他国家的经验表明，技术、经济和社会障碍（例如含水层响应的不确定性）可能会阻碍ATES的广泛部署缺乏对能源储存技术的经济价值和脱碳潜力的了解，以及公众缺乏理解或接受。该项目汇集了地球科学家、地球工程师、经济学家和社会科学家，旨在解决英国部署 ATES 的主要障碍，提出可为政府政策、监管框架、规划当局以及能源和基础设施公司提供信息的解决方案。该项目整合了四个关键领域，将技术地球科学和地球工程研究与经济和社会科学研究相结合。这种集成方法对于解决部署障碍至关重要。我们的总体目标是提供解决方案和建议，促进将英国 ATES 的容量提高到数吉瓦（当前容量增加一千倍），并在英国各地广泛部署项目。我们的研究将确定英国的 ATES 能力，将供需联系起来，并为政策制定者和规划者绘制地图。我们将通过进行现场试验和实验室实验来了解英国主要含水层如何响应 ATES。我们将确定部署和操作 ATES 系统的策略，以最大限度地提高存储容量和效率，同时考虑到在设计自然系统时不可避免的含水层行为的不确定性。我们的经济研究将量化 ATES 的经济价值，考虑安装的生命周期成本和运营，以及 ATES 可以为更广泛的能源系统提供附加值，在需求低迷时存储来自风能和太阳能的多余可再生能源。我们将在生命周期背景下量化 ATES 的脱碳潜力，以便将其与其他低碳供暖和制冷方案进行客观比较。我们的社会科学研究将确保负责任地部署 ATES，促进根据社会优先事项和价值观共同设计 ATES 项目。它将利用国际案例来确定最佳实践，并确定和量化更广泛的社会效益，例如发展对技能工作的需求的潜力。

项目成果

Numerical simulation of aquifer thermal energy storage using surface-based geologic modelling and dynamic mesh optimisation

使用基于地表的地质建模和动态网格优化对含水层热能存储进行数值模拟

• DOI: 10.1007/s10040-022-02481-w
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: Hydrogeology Journal
• 影响因子: 2.8
• 作者: Regnier G

Predicting the risk of saltwater contamination of freshwater aquifers during aquifer thermal energy storage

预测含水层热能储存过程中淡水含水层盐水污染的风险

• DOI: 10.1007/s10040-023-02630-9
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: Hydrogeology Journal
• 影响因子: 2.8
• 作者: Regnier G