Chilled water is used in many commercial facilities for the purpose of cooling the facility. The process involves extracting heat from the water and then circulating the water throughout the facility in order to cool it. The heat is extracted at a component known as a cooling tower, located on the roof of the facility. Normally, this heat is allowed to dissipate into the atmosphere.
This is no small amount of heat. “The amount of wasted heat can be 25% more than the cooling that the process creates.” Chilled water reclamation is the process of reclaiming this heat and using it in other applications in the facility as opposed to letting it go to waste. This heat can be used for a number of purposes, including:
- Building Heating
- Service Water Heating
- Process Hot Water
There are a number of ways in which a chilled water reclamation system can be structured. Overall the goal is to reduce the amount of heat that is pumped to the cooling tower and reclaim this heat before it gets there. This can be done by installing a more efficient chiller that generates less waste heat. It can be also be accomplished with the use of a device called a heat reclaim chiller, which captures heat “to divert it to a device that can capture the heat and convert it into a useful heat source.”
One of the many important components of a chilled water system is the chilled water storage tank. Water can be chilled at night during off-peak hours to cut costs and sent to a chilled water storage tank, which is insulated to keep the water chilled for use throughout the following day. Pictured below are two 35,000 gallon vertical insulated water storage tanks that Tanks Direct installed at the AT&T data center in Manassas, Virginia.
Source:
http://dms.hvacpartners.com/docs/1001/public/0a/04-581025-01.pdf
http://hpac.com/air-conditioning/recovering_heat_chilledwater