CASE STUDY 3
Grande Cheese Technology Center
The Grande Tech Center is an amalgamation of several different heat recovery and energy savings projects integrated into one energy sharing system. The base system is a heat pump system using a cooling tower to reject heat in the summer and boiler to provide heat in the winter. This facility was ideal for a heat pump since the milk testing lab generates and excessive amount of heat. The heat pump from that space rejects the heat into the heat pump loop, sharing that heat with the remaining spaces during the winter. Much like The Osthoff Resort, the waste heat from the coolers is also rejected into the heat pump loop. This provides additional free heat in the winter. The crowning jewel of this system is an ice storage system with a Rohde Brothers design and built chiller. The ice storage system shifts the energy costs associated with the load to the off peak electric rates resulting in over a 50% savings in cooling costs. Additionally, the heat rejected from the chiller is dumped into the heat pump loop providing additional free heat in the winter. The highlights of the system are as follows:
- Boiler Tower Heat Pump System
- Waste heat recovered from milk sample coolers
- Ice storage system builds ice during off peak electrical rates
- Chiller for ice building utilizes a VFD for compressor operation maximizing the chillers efficiency
- Waste Heat from Thermal Ice Storage process is used for HVAC Heating requirements
Rohde Brothers Custom Built Chiller with VFD for smoother compressor operation