EVENTS
INCORPORATING COLD CHAIN
IIR conference looks at
natural refrigerant technologies
By Ilana Koegelenberg
The seventh International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR) conference on ammonia and CO 2
refrigeration technologies took place 11–13 May 2017 in Ohrid in the Republic of Macedonia, with
some South Africans attending too.
I
t was a very successful event, attended
by 155 participants from 43 countries
worldwide, including Australia, Asia,
Japan, Europe, and China. The US was
not well represented at all. It was the third
conference to be attended by Evert
Potgieter of Pam Refrigeration in Cape
Town, with Dawie Kriel of Energy Partners
also attending from South Africa.
This was a unique IIR conference
where approximately 40% of the
participants came from developing
countries, which offered an opportunity
for the exchange of experience and
the transfer of new technologies to
take place.
“Of particular interest was the critical
charge ammonia system and packaged
small units for a wide range of
applications. Of all the delegates, there
were probably close to 20 that I had met
before at the IIR conference,”
said Potgieter.
The open discussion led by Andy
Pearson of Star Refrigeration attracted a
30
keen interest of all delegates. The key
topics discussed at the conference
included: design of modern ammonia
and CO 2 systems and technological
innovations; improving energy efficiency;
various applications (like commercial,
industrial, chillers, and heat pumps);
technical guidelines; and safety
regulations. In total, 43 papers were
presented. • Armin Hafner, NTNU, Norway:
“Integrated CO 2 system for
refrigeration, air conditioning and
sanitary hot water”;
• Robert Lamb, Star Refrigeration, UK:
“Low charge packaged ammonia
refrigeration systems”; and
• Alexander Pachai, JCI-Sabroe,
Denmark: “Freezing systems for high
ambient temperatures”.
The keynote lectures were presented by
recognised experts:
• Andy Pearson, president of Scientific
Committee and former president
of the Institute of Refrigeration
(IoR), UK: “Mega-trends in industrial
refrigeration”;
• Predrag Hrnjak, University of Illinois,
US: “Efficient very low charged
ammonia refrigerating systems”;
• Sergio Girotto, ENEX srl, Italy:
“Improved trans-critical CO 2
refrigeration systems for warm
climate”; Other papers presented ways to reduce
the ammonia charge in all parts of the
refrigeration system and new types of
components; how to improve the
defrosting process; improving old
systems in developing countries;
mechanical integrity inspection
protocols for refrigeration systems; and
so forth.
The theme of CO 2 systems featured in
many papers that introduced
innovations in trans-critical systems
especially, such as using ejectors as
expansion devices, parallel compression,
www.coldlinkafrica.co.za
and internal heat exchangers. To
achieve a subcritical operation, papers
with evaporative condenser and
air-cooled condenser combined with
water spray and wet pad were
presented. The CO 2 systems are more
efficient in locations with warm climates.
Various applications were of interest
to end users, for instance, cold stores;
food and drink processing; supermarkets;
liquid chillers; high-temperature heat
pumps; salmon chilling; and snow-
making generators.
HFC phase-down schedules under the
Kigali Amendment to the Montreal
Protocol were analysed and a survey
on the global market and policy trends
for CO 2 and ammonia systems
were discussed.
Within the conference, a SuperSmart
workshop was organised. SuperSmart is
an EU project to speed up the uptake of
more energy-efficient refrigeration,
heating, and cooling solutions for
Europe’s food retail sector by reducing
COLD LINK AFRICA • September | October 2017