SOLAR ENERGY AND THE HEAT PUMP IN A NORTHERN CLIMATE.

The Alumni House-Conference Center (AHCC) on the campus of the State University of New York at Albany, combines 2300 s. ft. of copper solar panels with a water-to-water heat pump, an air-to-water heat pump, and electric boiler and two eight thousand gallon storage tanks. The building described is instrumented to test a solar heating system and to provide data for the time variant electric power demands, the impact of meteorological variables, peak storage capabilities, the efficiency of the solar panels, coefficient of performance of the heat pumps and the heating system performance factor. Computer simulations of the heat budget of the AHCC have been prepared and verified.