[Equest-users] ERV in Ottawa

[Brian Fountain]

Hi Daniel,

I haven't looked at your model yet -- will try and take a look this 
afternoon.

One thing to consider is the outdoor air fraction and the supply air 
temperature setpoint.  If you have a low OA fraction, say 15% and a low 
supply air temperature, say 55F -- then often you will be mixing to 
satisfy that SAT and the heat recovery will only come into play for very 
cold temperatures.  Meanwhile, you will be adding static pressure on 
your system and seeing notable increased fan energy.

On the other hand, if you have a dedicated outdoor air system then you 
will see dramatic savings with an ERV.

I saw that you were playing with the ERV control -- FLOAT is the default 
and maximizes heat recovery always -- this would be typical of a heat 
pipe where you can't modulate the heat recovery.  Trim economizer is 
non-typical -- bringing in more OA to compensate for excess heat 
recovery.  I usually use MA reset.  Have a look at the ERV report in the 
.sim report to see actual heat recovered (plus the added fan energy 
which is NOT reported on the SV-A report and defaults at 1" for both 
supply and return).

Brian



On 12/9/2010 12:55 PM, Daniel Knapp wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I've been trying to understand how ERV works because I am finding the energy savings to be somewhat less than I had expected.  Ottawa has a very cold climate in the winter and a warm, humid climate in the summer and I would expect enthalpy wheels to be a very good energy saving strategy.  Instead, I am finding that in many cases the building uses more energy and in the best case scenario (OA exhaust DH, mixed air reset, modulate HX) on a VAV system saves only 0.15%.  I have built a simple box model with one system in a two-storey office building and tried a number of different control strategies (see attached tables for results).  I have tried a VAV and a SZ system.  The ERV is able to save marginally more energy in the SZ system, but in neither case are the results what I was expecting.
>
> My question is this:  are these results to be taken at face value and believed or is there a better way to model ERVs in a Canadian climate?  It seems very unlikely to me that ERVs cannot be controlled in such a way as to save significant energy in a climate of extremes.  (.inp file attached as well).
>
> With thanks and best wishes,
> Dan
>
>
> ---
> Daniel Knapp, PhD, LEED® AP O+M
> danielk at arborus.ca
>
> Arborus Consulting
> Energy Strategies for the Built Environment
> www.arborus.ca
> 76 Chamberlain Avenue
> Ottawa, ON, K1S 1V9
> Phone: (613) 234-7178 ext. 113
> Fax: (613) 234-0740
>
>
>
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