In Japan, district heating and cooling system (DHC) is expected to be a promising system from the aspect of achieving efficient energy utilization at the district scale. DHC conserves energy due to its advantages such as the utilization of natural and unused heat sink/source and the introduction of high-efficiency equipment. Numerous studies on the advantages of DHC have been conducted in order to improve the energy saving effect from the advantages. However, so far, any verification concerning "Concentration effect", which is one of the most important advantages of DHC, has not been conducted. Concentration effect is provided by the combination of the heat demand of each building, and it is influenced by the following two elements. 1) "Demand-side parameters" Heat load profile and temperature difference of hot/cold water between supply and return. 2) "Division of heat source chillers" The number of heat source equipment and the chiller capacity ratio. In this study, sensitivity analysis which parameterizes the abovementioned elements is performed by simulation in order to reveal the relationship between energy efficiency ratio and these elements. The results would reveal some important information to improve "concentration effect". We have selected absorption chiller and boiler system DHC, which uses gas as its main energy source, as the case study. Only cooling heat source system, which energy efficiency varies widely, is verified. The simulation settings are set to the average values, and the parameters used in the sensitivity analysis are based on the measurement data of 7 existing DHC plants. The analysis results show as follows: ・Energy efficiency varies by up to 0.13 according to demand-side parameters. Further, it is proved that the equivalent full load hour of cooling load profile must be long, and temperature difference of cold water must be remained at a designed value for achieving high energy efficiency. ・Energy efficiency increases as the number of chillers becomes larger. However, its effect almost disappears when the number of chillers is over 6. The chiller capacity hardly affects energy efficiency unless the chiller capacity ratio is very simple, for example, when chillers are equally divided. ・Division of heat source equipment is not important in the case where the equivalent full load hour of cooling load profile is long, or speed variable pumps are introduced. ・In absorption chiller and boiler system, power consumption of pumps is the dominant factor which affects energy efficiency. In winter and at intermediate time when there is little cooling load, power consumption of pumps differs greatly. ・In this study, the plant without co-generation system (CGS) is verified. However, nowadays most of DHC plants tend to introduce CGS. Thus, the case of the plant with CGS must be verified.
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