COLD STORE ENERGY USAGE AND OPTIMISATION

Data on the performance (energy, temperature of the store and annual product throughout) of refrigerated cold stores was collected using a web based survey. The preliminary data collected was compared to data collected in New Zealand and data presented by the IIR. The energy efficiency of the cold stores examined was found to vary widely and this could not be attributed to either temperature of the store or product throughput. Work to collect more data is ongoing as part of the ICE-E (Improving Cold storage in Europe) project and this will compare a greater number of variables such as location of the store, door openings, door protection, refrigerant type, leakage of refrigerant, refrigeration system components and structure of the cold store.