We present all the details of a Success Story on the installation of a commercial refrigeration project in a store in Colombia.
by ACR Latin America
10 kilometers from Bogotá, Capital of Colombia, is a well-known municipality called Chía, which belongs to the department of Cundinamarca. There, the distribution and installation company Prime Refrigeration SAS carried out a cooling project in the Chia Olympic Super Drugstore (SDO) belonging to the consortium of Supertiendas y Droguerías Olímpica S.A / Chía and which was executed in October 2016.
The new project aimed to achieve significant energy savings, reduce operating costs, have a fast installation and obtain control and temperature stability of products.
José Luis Herrera, commercial director of Prime, explained that the project had the participation of three recognized brands in the market and that in the first instance, this installed store project becomes the first in Latin America to have a high efficiency system.
"The Heos system is the high-efficiency solution designed by Carel for supermarkets of all surface ranges from convenience supermarkets to hypermarkets. It represents a new way of building refrigeration systems, using self-contained refrigerated furniture equipped with direct current compressors (DC Compressors), electronic expansion valves and state-of-the-art controllers. A water loop that carries the heat produced by condensation to the outside of the warehouse. The Prime Display refrigerated murals have been designed to include the latest in energy-saving technology and give the store a modern and attractive look for its customers," explained José Luis.
Regarding the operating process that is carried out with this installation, the Prime representative explained that "the process that this system fulfills is to optimize the refrigeration of the furniture displaying perishable products in supermarkets. It is a type of direct expansion refrigeration operating with R410A with electronic expansion valves and inverter compressors. The condensation process is done through a cold water system and trunk with the option of it being through a cooling tower or an air-cooled liquid condenser. It covers all the refrigerated furniture needs of any project."
Likewise, José revealed the reasons why the company selected the aforementioned technology to be installed in this class of stores. "The proposal becomes attractive in its presentation as the technology exceeds these specific priorities, raises industry standards in terms of impact on the environment and, at the same time, generates needs to innovate regarding integral solutions for commercial refrigeration."
Difficulties solved
Every project has details that must be solved, sometimes with premise, and other times they take longer than expected. Prime's experience in this regard is considered positive, as it was learned in the first instance so as not to make the same mistakes on other occasions.
In this regard, José Luis said that "because it was our first import and assembly, the following were presented by minors: Logistics: in the import we had to manage several adjustments in the documentation to import within the correct items since the entire project was imported from Asia. Technical: the installation issues were so simple that some technical aspects were hesitated, but they were solved with the support of Carel, who accompanied us every step of the way."
Results and current operation
César Rodríguez, member of the maintenance department of Olímpica Distrito Bogotá, is the person in charge of supervising that the entire project and the systems work correctly. He highlighted the main details from his point of view from the installation through operation, efficiency, and final considerations.
Regarding the installation, César explained the following: "Although the operation of the system and the details of its assembly were not known, the installation was carried out without major setbacks in a reasonable time. With the knowledge acquired, better coordination can be done and fast installation times can be obtained. As the set is a very compact refrigerator and compression unit, it saves assembly time."
System operation
Regarding the operation of the teams, César Rodríguez highlighted the results obtained so far, which have been positive. The project has not presented refrigerant leaks and the electrical installation has been working properly.
"Without ignoring that the climatic conditions of Chia are very favorable for cooling systems that work by condensation with water, as the report says, the team has worked very well, we have not had major inconveniences, except for some adjustments in the control part, especially when the energy goes away."
On the behavior of the temperatures of the refrigerators, he said that "it has been excellent, as well as the other operating parameters. The advancement of the system with the inclusion of the electronic expansion valve has many advantages in terms of handling both suction and discharge pressures, together with the versatility of the variable speed compressor. A 'smooth' operation can be evidenced that a longer duration of its elements will not possibly be allowed."
Finally, the condensation system with air condenser and variable speed pumps has worked smoothly with very good condensation pressures below 20 °C steadily. with low operating speeds, explained César, who also spoke about the control system. "It has not presented major failures in the time of operation, the centralized equipment collects all the data on the computer that is on site."
At press time, the project only had pending the arrival of the important additional spare units to have in case of any damage, and to solve the connection via remote for constant monitoring from the office.
BOX 1
Technical description
Technical characteristics of the installed system and differences compared to traditional installations in supermarkets.
BOX 2
Overview
Installation signature: Prime Refrigeration SAS
Manufacturers involved: Carel, Prime Display, Dicol
Company or place covered with the installation: Supertiendas y Droguerías Olímpica S.A / Chia
Installation dates: October 2016
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