Ammonia

High performance ammonia heat pumps are the driving force in the largest mine water heat network in Great Britain.

Climate-conscious shoppers may buy local food and try to cut packaging waste, but those efforts could be negated by potent greenhouse gases leaking from supermarket fridges.

A Canadian safety authority is urging systems operators to employ licensed refrigeration contractors when carrying out work on ammonia systems following a fatal leak last year.

A newly released report by the European Commission (EC) pushes the adoption of heat pumps using natural refrigerants as a way to develop the European heat pump market against non-European competition.

Italian manufacturer Zudek’s air-cooled, low-charge ammonia/NH₃ (R717) chiller has improved the energy efficiency ratio (EER) of a cooling system at a pharmaceutical site in Belgium, by 20%, compared to its previous HFC-based unit.

The European Parliament’s environmental committee’s rapporteur has called for an outright ban on HFC and HFO refrigerants in most common uses and an even steeper phase down.

Nuclear power is one way of sustainably producing ammonia, Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have modeled how much it would cost to use more environmentally friendly methods that emit less carbon to produce ammonia, finding nuclear-powered and renewable ammonia (NH₃) production to be feasible, despite costs still being high.

The next edition of the CO₂ and Ammonia Refrigeration Technologies will take place on April 27-29, 2023 in Ohrid, R. Macedonia. It will be organized by the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering – Skopje together the with the International Institute of Refrigeration (Paris).

ATMOsphere announced the release of the “North American Guide to Natural Refrigerants in Ice Arenas,” including information on ammonia systems.

German manufacturer GEA Heating & Refrigeration Technologies has retrofitted Irish dairy Aurivo with an energy-efficient ammonia/NH₃ (R717) refrigeration and heat pump system, increasing the Irish dairy’s hourly milk processing capacity by 80%, reducing energy consumption by 12% and realizing annual operational savings in excess of €347,000 (US$344,937).

SCM REF Australia, Beijer Ref Australia’s manufacturing operation, has installed transcritical CO₂ systems in between 250 and 280 locations in Oceania over the past four years, noting a growing interest in all applications, particularly at convenience stores.

Since introducing its Evapcold low-charge ammonia/NH₃ (R717) packaged units in 2016, U.S. OEM Evapco has installed 100 of the units across 25 industrial sites, with each site using between one and 10 units, said Kurt Liebendorfer, Vice President of Evapco.

Scottish OEM Star Refrigeration announced that it has replaced U.K. dairy First Milk’s aging R404A cheese chilling system with the low-charge ammonia/NH₃ (R717) Azanechiller 2.0, improving operating efficiency by 25% while also increasing production throughput capacity by almost 30%.

Started accepting orders for commercial freezers using natural refrigerants.

Scantec Refrigeration Technologies, an Australian industrial refrigeration system provider, installed a low-charge ammonia/NH₃ (R717) system to serve three high-rise freezer rooms at a Malaysian cold storage facility, achieving a specific energy consumption (SEC) more than seven times lower than that of the facility’s previous ammonia liquid-overfeed system.

Energy Partners Refrigeration (EPR), a South African cooling-as-a-service (CaaS) implementer, installed a 10MW (2,843TR) two-stage ammonia/NH₃ (R717) system at South Africa’s largest dairy company, Clover, in 2022, and the performance has so far exceeded forecasts.

“Awareness is very important” for the wider adoption of ammonia/NH₃ (R717)-based industrial refrigeration in Australia, said Stefan Jensen, Managing Director at Scantec Refrigeration Technologies, an Australian industrial refrigeration system provider.

Cimco Refrigeration, a Toronto-based refrigeration contractor, recently partnered with Canadian environmental and engineering consultancy Pinchin to create an ammonia/NH₃ (R717)-based “fifth-generation” district heating and cooling system in Canada.

Italian compressor manufacturer Dorin has tested a process-cooling CO₂ (R744) chiller in several North American climate zones and found that they have “great potential” in combined cooling and heating applications.

The EU-funded project Refrigerants, Naturally! RefNat4LIFE has recently launched two free online courses – also known as massive online open courses (MOOC) – on natural refrigerants to support store owners’ and technicians’ transition away from f-gases.