Tabreed launches four pilot R&D projects
Projects will contribute towards an improvement in operational efficiency, while enhancing district cooling plant life and reliability
National Central Cooling Company (Tabreed), the UAE-based international district cooling provider, has announced the launch of four pilot projects, part of the company’s R&D funding commitment, which reinforces its commitment towards sustainability beyond just environmental benefits.
In a statement, Tabreed said that the four pilot projects would also contribute towards an improvement in operational efficiency, while enhancing district cooling plant life and reliability, with the funding expected to contribute towards increasing plant efficiency by 30% against comparable industry performance benchmarks, while also lowering overall plant lifecycle costs.
Commenting on the announcement, Bader Saeed Al Lamki, Tabreed’s Chief Executive Officer, said: “Innovation, research and development is a very important pillar in our business strategy. Developing appropriate infrastructure, while preserving the environment is one of the key priorities in UAE Vision 2030 and we are committed to our key role in supporting the UAE’s sustainable development agenda.
“Energy Efficiency is essential more than ever, and I am very proud of the relentless efforts of our innovation focused teams who continuously work to make sure we adopt the latest technologies and pioneer the district cooling industry with highest efficiency and less impact on our environment.”
“Future of Cooling” is the name of the first initiative. It aims to introduce new concept design and control philosophy as well as innovative and disruptive technologies into each district cooling plant, resulting in material improvements in plant performance as well as a prolonged life and lower plant lifecycle costs.
“Based on the simulation of this pilot project, we forecast a 25 to 30% increase in performance, compared to our industry benchmarks,” said François-Xavier Boul, Tabreed’s Chief Development Officer.
“We will be tendering two projects based on this concept to validate how actual results compare to our analysis. This approach will be implemented accordingly in our existing plant operations (through retrofitting) and into future plants,” he added.
Another R&D initiative is “Carbon NanoTube” which aims at drastically enhancing the performance and life span of plant and equipment as well as reducing plant and energy transfer station (ETS) footprints using carbon nanotube (CNT) material which has outstanding properties in terms of heat transfer.
“We are in discussion with a number of partners to provide us with the material and support such as ENGIE Lab CRIGEN in France, Sustainable Energy Development Research Group, and another reputed higher education institution in the region,” said Boul.
“Through these partnerships we will run pilot projects to confirm this approach to be adopted in our future plants.”
The third initiative is called “Wet Bulb Forecasting”. It aims to drastically enhance demand side management. The initiative aims to more accurately forecast customer demand for the next 24 hours to allow for a more efficient operation by optimising production of cooling, using AI.
The first step is to rely on a stable weather forecasting system based on information updated in real time. The second step will be to use data science to develop models and correlations and finally, based on demand forecast, drive the plant performance.
The last initiative targets enhancing the district cooling plant’s condenser circuit and its cooling tower, which is one of the critical components in the plant and has a significant impact on the plant’s performance.
Tabreed is currently redesigning the equipment to enhance its efficiency through improving water and air distribution as well as heat transfer, which will eventually impact the overall performance of the plant, the statement concluded.
