Concepts for thermoacoustic components for heating and cooling applications in buildings

In the EU, buildings account for around 40 % of energy consumption and 36 % of greenhouse gas emissions. Legal requirements to reduce GHG emissions create medium to long-term potential for innovative technologies for the sustainable provision of heating and cooling, such as thermoacoustic systems. These are operated without the use of climate-relevant refrigerants and fossil fuels and require little electrical energy. The aim of the TA-Concept project is to develop an energetically and geometrically optimised thermoacoustic core, which will subsequently be used for sustainable heating and cooling in buildings in the low output range. Research activities show that the efficiency of thermoacoustic systems depends heavily on the specification of the components. The degree of innovation compared to projects in similar fields of research lies in the modification of the basic construction methods of core components adapted to thermoacoustic applications, as well as in the detailed investigation of the heat exchangers. As a result, an energetically and geometrically optimised thermoacoustic core with an efficient heat exchanger and regenerator is expected, with which an increase in the quality levels can be realised. This is to be subjected to experimental validation. An energetic evaluation is carried out on the basis of quality grades by varying the system pressure, working medium, drive, source and sink temperature.