Energy, environmental-based cost, and solar share comparisons of a solar driven cooling and heating system with different types of building

[Display omitted] •Solar thermal and PV for cooling/heating with absorption heat pump.•Optimization of energy, economy, and solar share for five building types.•Solar devices afford at least 31% cooling/heating loads.•Sensitivity analysis against price and renewable energy penetration rate. To reduce fossil fuel consumption and carbon emissions from building energy systems, a solar-based cooling and heating system is proposed here employing solar concentrating collectors, photovoltaics, double-effect absorption heat pump and thermal storage. The system is applied to five building types in a region with cold winter and hot summer. The system configuration is optimized using energy, environmental cost, and solar fraction as criteria. The results demonstrate that the solar system could produce at least 31.1% of the cooling/heating loads resulting in 73.3% and 64.2% energy and cost savings in a hospital. The coefficient of performance of the hybrid system ranges from 5.87 to 7.56 in cooling mode, and 1.22 to 1.65 for heating. The cost of devices is the most sensitive factor, and followed by the price of grid electricity. Increasing the renewable energy penetration rate could improve the energy performance, but decrease the cost saving ratio due to the lower carbon emissions.