Techno-economic performance evaluation of building cooling systems: A study of snow storage and conventional chiller systems

• We developed a framework for techno-economic evaluation of building cooling systems.
• The framework evaluates the performance of different types of snow storage systems.
• Performance of various snow storage systems is compared with conventional chillers.

The residential building sector in Canada consumes 17% of the total energy and contributes to 15% of the total greenhouse gas emissions. Predominantly, the energy demand for cooling in the residential sector is increasing due to large occupancy floor area and high usage of air-conditioning. Minimizing energy use and associated emissions is one of the highest priority goals set for national energy management strategies in developed countries, including Canada. In this research, a probabilistic feasibility evaluation framework is developed to: i) evaluate the techno-economic performance of different snow storage systems, namely conventional snow storage, watertight snow storage, high-density snow storage, and ii) compare the performance of snow storage systems with the conventional chiller system. The technical and economic performances of all the building cooling system alternatives are evaluated in terms of the coefficient of performance and the total cooling cost per kilowatt-hour at the facility, respectively. Monte-Carlo simulations were performed to address the uncertainties involved in the techno-economic parameters. The framework has also been implemented on a low-rise residential building in Kelowna (British Columbia, Canada) to appraise its practicality. The study results verified that overall snow storage systems are more energy efficient and cost effective options for building cooling systems. This research will support decision-makers in future for selecting sustainable options for building cooling systems.