Thermal Tunnel

In recent years the drive to reduce carbon emissions and reliance on fossil fuel led to large increase in the use of renewable energy heating and cooling technologies. Ground source heat pump systems are one of these renewable systems. The large tunnel-soil interface makes tunnel an attract subsurface structure to connect building heat pump system to the low entropy energy stored in the ground. A review of past design experience and existing constructed thermal tunnels in the world was carried out. This was followed by a comparison of traditional methods to quantify the heat extraction potential for 2 tunnel types, metro in urban setting and research tunnels in deeper natural systems. Conceptual designs, operational and maintenance needs of the tunnels are researched.