Integrated energy planning towards carbon neutrality for university campus in Northern China

Nowadays, the energy consumptions in buildings constitute about one-third of the world’s total energy utilization, and this is projected to rise to 40% by 2030. The university campus, with large number of buildings, plays an important role in energy consumption. Therefore, planning an intergrade energy system towards carbon neutrality for the campus has become an urgent issue to be settled. In this study, a general framework of intergrade energy planning for the university campus is proposed by systematically analyzing the dynamic characteristics of energy demand, resources and storage units. Firstly, the energy consumption models for typical classified buildings in the campus are built, and the dynamic energy demand of campus buildings is predicted. Secondly, the application condition of renewable energy in the campus is investigated and the potential of renewable energy is evaluated from the aspects of solar energy, shallow geothermal energy, deep geothermal energy, and sewage source. Finally, to achieve the balance between energy supply and demand sides, both short-term and long-term energy storage technologies for the campus integrated energy system are proposed. The results show that due to the different functions and usage habits of typical buildings, there are obvious complementary characteristics of the daily load distribution between typical buildings, while there is a large fluctuation in the seasonal load distribution. The application of renewable energy such as photovoltaics has an unbalanced problem between supply and demand sides. Therefore, the construction of a green, safe and economical energy storage system is the key approach for the campus to achieve carbon neutrality, which requires a dynamic balance analysis between supply and demand sides.