Development and monitoring of the MEED high efficient shower heat recovery unit. Issue 1 (1st September 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Jacobs, Piet; Kemp, Richard; Vijlbrief, Olav
• Is Part Of: IOP conference series. Volume 1085:Issue 1(2022)
• Publication Date: 2022-09-01
• Subjects: Earth sciences -- Periodicals; Environmental sciences -- Congresses; Environmental sciences -- Periodicals; 550.5
• DOI: 10.1088/1755-1315/1085/1/012027
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1755-1307

Abstract

Abstract: In well isolated dwellings especially with multiple residents domestic hot water (DHW) accounts often for more than 50% of the energy consumption.Currently there exist shower heat recovery units which recover 40 - 70 percent of the heat in the shower water. This efficiency can drop due to fouling of the heat exchanger, which is often not accessible. Further this is a component efficiency. The system efficiency also depends on the cooling down of the shower water due to evaporation and conduction losses to wall and floor tiles. During renovation it is often practically only possible to preheat the cold water port of the thermostat with the shower heat recovery unit. The cold water feed to the boiler would then not be preheated. In apartments it is not possible to install the highly efficient pipe-in-pipe heat exchangers as they have to be installed on the floor below the bathroom. Which only leaves shower tray heat recovery units which are in the lower range of the mentioned efficiency. In practice therefore during renovation shower heat recovery is not often applied.To address these problems a new patented concept for shower heat recovery has been developed. The Multi Energy Efficient Shower cabin (MEED) involves an insulated shower cabin (tray and walls) which is closed to minimize evaporation losses. The hot shower water is pumped up and flows over an integrated helix heat exchanger. This heat exchanger is able to extract 82% of the heat and is accessible for cleaning. In the shower cabin also an electrical 10 liter 6 kW boiler is integrated, so all cold water is preheated and directly hot water is provided which minimalizes pipeline losses. The MEED has enough capacity to shower endlessly. The MEED has been installed in existing social rental housing, private housing and in hotels. First monitoring results indicate a system efficiency of more than 70%. Aside the shower the MEED is able to provide all DHW, which makes a storage vessel superfluous. This is provides important space gain in smaller dwellings.