A Study into Ambient Loop Systems and Challenges Associated with Accurate Metering and Billing of the End Users

In order to reduce the operational energy consumption in heating and cooling of buildings and the industry are exploring methods of combining district heating and cooling networks with tenant’s equipped with individual water source heat pumps. This has potential to create an ambient loop where tenants can exchange heat with each other, and a main source of heating or cooling can top up the energy demand of the loop. A challenge that arises in a system like this is how the landlord can accurately bill the tenants, when energy is shared between tenants via the landlord services loop. This study takes a theoretical approach on one potential solution where the billing software is able to use incoming data from energy meters and electricity meters, analyze the operational modes of the components in the system and proportion the energy usage accordingly.