INDUSTRIAL COOLING
Energy-saving cooling systems
Angus Hall, business line manager, Atlas Copco Process Cooling Solutions, explains how an innovative cooling/chilling system can improve manufacturing costs, lessen environmental impact, and help industries realise energy savings. All this is achievable by reducing chiller usage with the use of adiabatic and free- air coolers during the colder months of the year.
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n a wide variety of manufacturing operations, there is a need for process heat and for a means of reducing that heat with a water-cooling system. But in meeting these needs, what is not always factored in is the potential opportunity to reduce the running costs of energy, water treatment, and water supply involved in the process. The traditional approach to industrial cooling is refrigeration. That usually means employing big chillers of a megawatt and beyond in capacity. For many applications, this may prove to be an expensive-to-run solution that is not always necessary and, furthermore, is not the only answer. It pays plant managers and finance teams to investigate a solution that will reduce chiller usage and improve the efficiency and energy consumption of their cooling and chilled water systems – namely, a centralised adiabatic and free-air cooling installation. A concept that generates plant efficiencies, realises energy savings, and
16 November 2022 •
www.acr-news.com
minimises environmental impact. One of the ways to help achieve that aim is to take advantage of our temperate British climate, which is ideal for benefitting the plastics industry and other industries which rely on process cooling chillers. Met Office data shows that for 50% of the year, the average temperature is less than 10°C – and that is beneficial for the optimum energy-saving process cooling proposition: simply, that it is not necessary for 24/7 cooling operations to depend on chillers alone 100% of the time. Dependent upon the process, a correctly designed and balanced smart system utilises adiabatic coolers with bridge heat exchangers in the cooler/cold periods of the year and energy-efficient chillers in the warmer periods, thereby taking full advantage of ambient conditions to reduce running costs. Basically, it comes down to differing levels
of power consumption. A chiller needs energy for the compressor and the refrigeration
circuit, whereas a cooler only needs sufficient energy to power the cooling fans. A simple analogy to illustrate the differing principles is to think of a chiller as a refrigerator and a cooler as being a vehicle radiator that operates through airflow. Across industry the required process cooling temperature may vary widely. Pharmaceutical applications may operate at 10°C, a commercial bakery’s need can be for a continuous 15°C, and a distillery’s process will be in the region of 20°C. But within the plastics industry, a case study of one specific application that requires multiple temperature levels clearly demonstrated that the energy efficiency of a process cooling system can be maximised by a combination of chillers and coolers when ambient temperatures allow. In this instance, the plastics manufacturing company’s injection moulding operations required a process water cooling circuit in the region of 25-30°C for the critical granule
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