Investigation of heating and cooling potential of a modular housing system for fattening pigs with integrated geothermal heat exchanger

This kind of housing is characterised in particular by the fact that the incoming air into the sections is subject to year-round conditioning depending of the outdoor temperature (pre-heating and pre-cooling of supply air). During the investigation period, the modular housing for 1280 fattening pigs effectively provides a heat quantity of 489,820 kWh at a mean performance of 59.7 kW as well as a cooling quantity of 18,455 kWh at a mean performance of 33.3 kW. This means that there is great potential for saving fossil fuel and energy costs as well as avoiding CO2 emissions. In contrast, the investment costs are higher than for comparable conventional pig houses.