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Renewable Energy Systems

Below a depth of roughly 8 feet, the earth retains a constant temperature. In southern Canada and Northern US, this temperature is approximately 10ºC all year round.

Specially designed geothermal piping, installed vertically or horizontally into the ground in a return closed-loop configuration, circulates water, extracting heat in the winter and shedding heat in the summer.

Geothermal heat pumps installed inside the building, compress heat from the geothermal system and convert it to heat air which is circulated to provide any building structure with heating. In the summer, the heat pumps reverse their process, extracting heat from the air in the building and depositing it into the geothermal system which carries it back into the ground.

Geothermal water pumps and heat pumps require electricity to run, however geothermal systems convert no fossil fuel or electric power to thermal energy making them 400% to 500% more efficient than the highest efficiency natural gas furnace, while creating no CO2 or GHG emissions. The actual heat is natural and free and comes from the ground.

Operating costs are typically 40% to 75% less than for conventional HVAC systems and will not be affected by rising fuel prices, such as in the case of natural gas, which has risen over 100% in the past 5 years .

Geothermal technology has advanced rapidly in the last five years, driving down installation costs substantially. The high cost of energy and environmental awareness have created a growing market where more efficient heat exchange equipment and sophisticated computer simulation engineering now produce extremely reliable, economical systems with the highest energy efficiency and with the complexity required to heat and cool large commercial buildings even on dense urban sites. These systems are clear choices both economically and environmentally.

Solar Technology

Solar energy can heat water (solar thermal) or can generate electricity (photovoltaic or PV). For commercial buildings, collectors can be positioned on roof tops, or sometimes on south or west facing walls. Solar equipment is still the most expensive renewable energy source, however various government rebates, makes solar energy feasible where other forms of renewable energy are limited.

Passive Solar Energy

Passive solar heat is the addition to a building's heat supply from direct radiation on the building structure. Buildings can be designed to capture more of the sun's radiation and building materials can be chosen to absorb and retain the heat, slowly releasing it at night or on cooler days. A solar "chimney" can be created by placing a sun penetrating glass shield on the exterior of the building, over a southerly or westerly solid wall with a cavity several inches deep left between the layers. The sun's heat is concentrated between the wall and the glass shield, creating a convection of rising heat, which is captured by a heat return ventilator at the top. The HRV circulates the heat into the building on cool days and expels it upward on warm days.

Hybrid Solar/Geothermal System

Solar energy is an excellent supplement to commercial geothermal systems. Commercial real estate is extremely expensive, and space to drill geothermal bore holes is often limited. If all the land available is used for geothermal bore holes and the building still requires more heat energy, solar panels on the roof can add heat to the water circulation system already being installed.

Emission Reductions

Geothermal systems require some electricity to circulate fluid through the geothermal loops and to operate the heat pumps in the building. Solar photovoltaic electricity can produce much of this electricity, increasing the reduction of green house gasses and carbon emissions. A carefully engineered "deep green" building can reduce emissions by 70%, 80% and even 100%.

Integration and Control

Ameresco Geothermal custom engineers and fully integrates every commercial system to maximize the renewable energy resources available to each individual building. We use sophisticated computer software to model energy production and energy use factoring in the building location, site geology, size, architecture, mechanical systems and occupant use. A state of the art automation system, continuously senses, measures and makes adjustments to the system in order to maintain consistent and constant comfort. The buildings' automation computers know how to optimize system operations to balance efficiency with effectiveness. The building becomes an ever changing integrated energy system that is continuously reacting to an infinite number of environmental factors, occurring both inside and outside the structure.