System and method for geothermal conduit loop in-ground installation and soil penetrating head therefor

Abstract

A geothermal in-ground conduit system and a method of constructing and installing same are described. The system comprises at least one loop of flexible tubing adapted to convect a heat exchange liquid therein. The loop has a lower end section and opposed spaced-apart elongated side sections communicating with one another. The lower end section is retained in a soil penetrating head. The soil penetrating head has a leading soil penetrating and ramming face formation. A force transmitting shaft is engageable with the soil penetrating head for transmitting a pushing force against the soil penetrating head to displace same in the soil while pulling the loop and guiding the loop into the soil as the penetrating face forms passages for permanent burial of at least a major portion of the loop together with the soil penetrating head, or the soil penetrating head can be retracted.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD[0001]A geothermal, in-ground, conduit system and a method of constructing and installing same, to capture thermal energy stored in soil, are described.BACKGROUND ART[0002]With the high cost of electricity and gas, more and more interest is directed to the use of other sources of energy and in recent years particular attention has been given to tapping the geothermal energy stored in the ground. Such energy is renewable as it comes from the sun, but more important such energy does not produce any harmful gas emission which is released in the atmosphere as is the case with combustible products. The use of such energy also results in a cost-saving to heat and cool a building structure. It has been calculated that by using geothermal energy, as opposed to combustible energy, an average house prevents the emission of 2.5 to 5 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, each year. Accordingly, there is a need to improve the technology to extract this geothermal energy and ...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0005]It is a feature of the present invention to provide a geothermal in-ground conduit system and method of installation which greatly reduces the disadvantage of the prior art mentioned hereinabove.

[0006]Another feature of the present invention is to provide a soil penetrating head for use in a geothermal in-ground conduit system to position a flexible tubing loop in the soil and which greatly facilitates the installation of the loop into the soil.

[0012]Another feature of the present invention is to provide a geothermal in-ground conduit system comprised of at least one loop of flexible tubing and wherein the elongated side sections of the loop are spaced-apart a distance sufficient to permit extraction of heat from its surrounding areas without interfering from the surrounding area of the adjacent elongated side sections and wherein there are no tubes required for housing the loop as the side sections are each in direct contact with the surrounding soil thereby greatly increasing the efficiency of such closed loop conduit systems.

Problems solved by technology

Because the conduits are closely spaced and located within a hole bored in rock or in tubes, the heat exchange with the surrounding soil is poor and consequently it is often necessary to have to bore many holes and install many pipes to extract sufficient amount of heat from the ground.

Accordingly, these systems have been found to be expensive.

Often it is necessary, at those depths, to drill through the bedrock and this adds considerably to the cost of the installation of the system.

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