Experiences in the Commercial Application of GSHP Systems in Kosovo

One of the most ambitious tasks is raising the share of EU energy consumption produced from renewable resources to 20 %. In that direction, due to investments made by EU in rehabilitation of Municipal infrastructure and building of new compounds like Palace of Justice (PoJ) in Prishtina it was required use of geothermal energy source as energy efficient option for heating and cooling combined with heat pumps (Ground Source Heat Pumps; GSHP). The option to use geothermal energy and type of geothermal system was supposed to be based upon the results of the geotechnical investigation and the investment requirements. All these arguments were basis for the dramatic challenge of GSHP installations in commercial buildings in Kosovo. The realized project of GSHP system in PoJ in Prishtina, funded by EU office in Prishtina, is the biggest in this part of Balkans and the aim of this paper is to present results and experiences from idea till the completion of the project and results achieved during these years of use of this very successful system. The results of geotechnical investigation, TRT (Thermal Response Test), Earth Engineering Design Simulation for thermal modeling of the underground fields of boreholes and technical solutions using BHE as energy sources and comparison between one or several heat pumps centers, will be presented. Some of practical problems and field empirical solutions will be discussed as well.