• Stansted Airport
    thermal response testing

  • Stansted, Essex, UK

////

test equipment photo

Test equipment

cross-sectional diagram

Ground conditions

plot of test data

Thermal response test data

Client
BAA Ltd
Principal Contractor
WJ Groundwater Ltd
Consultants
WSP Environment Ltd
Drilling subcontractor
Magpie Environmental Drilling Services Ltd

////

In order to show that ground source heating and cooling is feasible for the site, a 200 m deep closed loop borehole was installed and tested. Ground conditions on site consisted of Boulder Clay, London Clay and Thanet Sand overlying Chalk. Permanent casing was installed through overlying strata to the top of the Chalk with open hole drilling to depth. A 40 mm diameter HDPE loop was installed to 200 m depth with thermally enhanced grout pumped in from the bottom up. After completing the installation a thermal response test was carried out with a power input of 9 kW and a flow of 26 l/min. Data from the test was used to determine the parameters required to design a large scale closed loop geothermal system.

////

Key words

  • airport, infrastructure, chalk, closed-loop geothermal, TRT