| Abstract |
In recent times, many traffic accidents have occurred frequently inmost of the cold regions in Turkey due to the snowy and icy weather conditions. It is desirable that ice and snow be removed effectively to keep normal traffic operations. At present, chemical salts have been used extensively around the world. Hydronic snow melting on pavement has been applied as an alternative solution to the conventional chemical method. It has a remarkable advantage in using a low temperature heat sources including geothermal tail water, solar energy, and industrial waste heat. It is of great significance to save energy and reduce CO2 emissions. Exergy analysis has been considered as a powerful tool for assessing the performance of various energy systems. Energy analysis method has been widely used for simulation, design, modelling and performance evaluation of snow melting systems. This study dealt with modeling and analyzing the performance of a snow melting heating system from the power plant through the heating system to the roadbed using exergy analysis method, the so-called low exergy or LowEx approach, which has been and still being successfully used in sustainable buildings design. In this regard, a geothermal-based snow melting system was designed for melting of ice on a road of a university campus in the eastern region of Turkey. Differing from the previously conducted studies, exergetic analysis method was applied to this system to evaluate its performance through exergy efficiency. The lowest and highest exergy demand rates of the snow melting system were calculated to be about 110 kW and 186 kW at dead state temperatures of – 6,7 °C and – 11,9 °C, respectively while their corresponding exergy efficiency values varied between 2,08%-3,69%. |