This study deals with exergetic and thermoeconomic analyses of thermal energy storage (TES) systems, such as latent, sensible and thermochemical options coupled with different units for building heating applications under varying reference (dead-state) temperatures of 8 degrees C, 9 degrees C and 10 degrees C, respectively. It is found that the variation reference temperature affects the thermoeconomic parameters. The exergetic cost of the system becomes higher at the higher reference conditions, as directly proportional to the varying dead state conditions. It also becomes minimum at 8 degrees C reference temperature as 196.96 $/h while it is maximum at 10 degrees C dead-state temperature with 357.60 $/h. Furthermore, the maximum capital cost of the equipment is determined for the thermochemical TES as 4.612 $/h. So, the better optimization of this equipment may be considered. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.