Industrial Process Water Heat Pump

This project builds upon the findings from previous CalNEXT projects (ET23SWE0036: Industrial Heat Pump Market Study and ET23SWE0062: Craft Brewery Industrial Heat Pump Screening Tool) to facilitate the installation and characterization of an air-to-water heat pump system (“AWHP” or the “Technology”) in an industrial process. Rather than fully displacing energy from an existing system, this project aims to pre-heat the process’s storage water using an AWHP to alleviate the heat energy load on the existing natural gas boiler. The site under consideration, a soap manufacturer in San Diego, CA, requires 205°F process water for the production process. The AWHP will raise the temperature of the source water to an intermediary temperature, thus lessening the burden of cost and sizing associated with installing high temperature heat pumps, which are typically limiting factors in the deployment of the Technology. These lower temperature and smaller capacity AWHPs are more readily available within the market and provide a more economical pathway for this application, without the need for large, custom engineered systems which are typical for industrial applications. The goal of this electrification initiative is to reduce natural gas usage and greenhouse gas (“GHG”) emissions, while also demonstrating the efficacy of a heat pump within an industrial environment, and to provide a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the feasibility of the Technology for applicability within other processes at the considered site, as well as peer industrial manufacturers. The project will benefit utilities in reaching electrification objectives within a typically hard to reach sector, as well as providing them with the framework for understanding the natural gas, energy, and GHG impacts to guide future measure development. An objective of the project will be to determine a balance point in fuel prices at which cost neutrality can be achieved, providing a long-term approach to valuing the benefits of using an AWHP. This project will evaluate the cost-effectiveness of AWHPs in terms of Total Resource Cost (“TRC”) and Total System Benefit (“TSB”), which will be shared with utility stakeholders in an effort to facilitate the development of a custom measure within either the existing Custom/3rd Party programs or new electrification programs targeting the industrial sector.This project aligns with the CalNEXT Program’s “Process Heating Technology” research area of the “Process Loads” technology priority map (“TPM”) which has a “Medium” priority and an “Observe” role. Specifically, this targets the “Industrial Heat Pump Technologies” research initiative, which is noted as an “Immediate Need” for performance validation. The short-term outcome of this project will be to demonstrate the efficacy of a heat pump unit to displace natural gas load within an industrial process. The long-term benefit is the integration of the Technology within new electrification programs targeted towards the industrial sector. Utilities have ongoing decarbonization efforts within the residential and commercial sectors, however traction has not been found within the industrial sector. Industrial users represent a large percentage of fossil fuel use, especially for water heating systems, which this Technology could serve to supplement and eventually displace given favorable market pricing conditions and emphasis on GHG emissions.