Green designing of solar hot water systems using computer simulations

Abstract

Solar thermal installations are one of the popular types of renewable energy sources. This paper presents the comparison of the considered design variants of the typical solar hot water installation on the basis of Life Cycle Assessment. The simulations and the design criteria included:- optimal angle of inclination and orientation of collectors for the selected location (simulations in GetSolar),- optimal type of collectors (simulations in SimaPro).Life cycle analysis of solar hot water systems shows that this technology has the potential to reduce the environmental impact of hot water preparation while compared to the conventional energy sources. However, the optimisation criteria used for green designing in the life cycle perspective can significantly improve the environmental balance of the analysed technologies.