Cost effectiveness of heat recovery

We were requested to visit various retail sites in Ireland to evaluate the energy cost effectiveness of a water based heating system using heat reclaimed from commercial refrigeration packs.

The user had found that the refrigeration packs needed to be operated at more onerous conditions to provide the heat required. We used test and monitoring equipment to log operating pack temperatures and pressures with and without the heat reclaim system in circuit. We analysed the difference in performance for both the HT and LT packs to compare the increase in energy consumption with other methods of providing heating.

In both cases it was concluded that heating via high efficiency heat pump would be more cost effective that heat reclaim from the refrigeration systems. For future installations it was also determined that the capital cost would be lower.

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