Dunham Bush Ice Thermal Storage Modules Integrated with Packaged Chillers

Features:  
- Super efficient heat exchanger yields top performance 
- All welded coil construction means no leaks 
- Tough, well-insulated tank 
- East to install

Why Thermal Storage?

Thermal storage is a technology that has come of age. It meets today's need for flexible energy management. Whether you're the owner of a large building, a school executive, a hospital administrator or a manufacturer, you realize that energy costs are a major part of your annual budget, and a somewhat uncontrollable one. Today, you can do something about that. You can begin to manage your energy usage.

Thermal storage allows you to produce cooling when most convenient or least costly and use it for air conditioning or process cooling when you need it. You'll find that thermal storage is remarkably economical. In many cases, the equipment is no more costly than conventional, inflexible cooling systems. If you're adding cooling capacity to a given building or process, thermal storage can often provide it with no additional refrigeration equipment.

Building air conditioning systems using Ice-Cel thermal storage can be designed which cost little or no more than conventional chiller-only systems.

lce-Cel is a modular ice thermal storage tank. The tank is filled with water, in which is submerged a polyethylene tube heat exchanger. A glycol solution at about 26°F (-3.3°C) flowing inside the tubes causes the surrounding water to freeze. The chilled glycol solution is typically provided by a chiller having about 24 tons (84 kW) of cooling capacity. When fully frozen, the Ice-Gel stores 240 ton-hours (844 kWh) of cooling capacity, so it requires about 10 hours operation of a 24 ton (84 kW) chiller to fully freeze the water in the tank.

Then to serve a cooling load, the ice can be melted at a rate dictated by load, ranging from 0 to 50 tons (0 to 176 kW). For example, the Ice-Cel could serve a steady load of 20 tons (70 kW) for 12 hours. In providing cooling, the glycol solution flows from the Ice-Cel to the load device (such as an air handler) at a temperature of typically 34-38°F (1.1-3.3°C).