COMHPTES — Flexible Compact Modular Heat Pump and PCM based Thermal Energy Storage System for heat and cold industrial applications

COMHPTES aims to develop innovative heat pump (HP) and thermal energy storage (TES) cost-effective compact technologies, and to demonstrate them up to TRL 5 in a fully integrated flexible and modular system able to supply heat and cold energy on demand for industrial applications, including interfaces with affordable renewable energy systems (RES), waste heat recovery and district networks. The COMHPTES system will address industrial end-users with flexible heat loads and temperature requirements in the ranges from 0.5 to 10 MW-t and 5 to 225°C, respectively, which represent approximately half of the total industrial installations and a quarter of the total process heat consumption in EU. The COMHPTES system will build upon the compactness and modularity of its technologies to best comply with space constraints in industry, and to enable gradual technology adoption, thereby reducing large upfront investments and operational risks.

Background

Decarbonization of the industry needs to go beyond electrification-only. Most of the energy consumed by the industry (up to 80% depending on the sector), is consumed in the form of thermal energy (heat and cold) with variable demand characteristics in terms of thermal loads and temperature requirements hourly, in some cases even requiring process steam and industrial refrigeration simultaneously in different renewable driven thermal systems with the capacity to harvest renewable energy when its more cost-effective and deliver it when needed for industrial process heat and cooling applications is of utmost necessity.

The vast majority of companies are represented by small-medium industries with 0.5 to 10 MW-t of heat demand and employing batch-type or continuous-load manufacturing. These industries constitute approximately half in number despite of consuming altogether only about a quarter of total industrial heat. Found in urban industrial hubs with access to infrastructure, their proximity limits space for integrating onsite RES. This creates an opening for the compact technologies developed in COMHPTES, allowing optimized use of surrounding RES, potentially in tandem with on-site generation via smart dynamic controls.

Aim and objectives

COMHPTES overarching ambition is to be a cornerstone project that demonstrates and promotes new thermal systems and technologies (i.e. HP, TES, PTC, and integrated systems) for decarbonization of the industrial sector, and more specifically the industry segment in need for process heating and cooling in the ranges from [175° to 225°C] and 5°C (refrigeration), respectively. To achieve that the project will:

To validate at TRL 5 the COMHPTES modular industrial system able to reliably deliver heat and/or cooling on demand, leveraging from the integration with commercial renewable technologies.
To design, prototype and validate up to TRL 5 a novel HP built upon a modular compact digitally-controlled Compressor Expander and compact heat exchangers for applications in industry
To design, prototype and validate up to TRL 5 circular by design compact TES systems for industrial applications with a storage energy CAPEX cost below to 15 €/kWht.
To evaluate the technical, economic, environmental and social impact of the proposed COMHPTES system and specific TES and HP technologies and promote their adoption.

Project partners

Kungliga Tekniska Hoegskolan
Absolicon Solar Collector AB
MG Sustainable Engineering AB
Synchrostor
Build to Zero, SL

Funding is provided within the Clean Energy Transition Partnership 2023 programme by Energimyndigheten (for the Swedish partners) with project number P2024-02903.

Timeframe: December 2024 – November 2027

Researchers