Multi-function (4-pipe) Air Cooled Water Chiller

High efficiency, modular multi-functional unit for 4-pipe systems with scroll compressors, multi-refrigerant circuits, plate heat exchangers for the user-side cooling and heating circuits, air source and axial fans.

Multi-functional chillers are machines designed for use in all applications where there may be a simultaneous and independent demand for hot and cold water production.

In particular, this occurs for all systems that use 4-pipe terminals, such as for example dual aspect buildings, buildings with large glazed surfaces or high-insulation buildings with non-homogeneous crowding levels.

The 4-pipe multi-functional unit is able to meet simultaneous and independent heat loads of opposite sign, with the advantage of working in heat recovery operation: whenever there is a simultaneous demand for cooling and heating, the multi-functional unit will work in recovery mode, and move the thermal energy from rooms that need to be cooled to those that need to be heated.

If the two heat loads are not balanced, then the controller works in mixed mode to recover as much thermal energy as possible and use the air exchanger as heat source with which to exchange the missing amount of capacity for meeting both demands of the system.

The 4-pipe multi-functional unit can therefore work indirectly all year round to meet all the thermal and cooling energy demands of the system and is therefore an alternative to conventional systems based on the chiller/boiler combination with the additional non-negligible advantage of waste heat recovery.

Depending on the various scenarios that can occur over the span of a day, the multi-functional unit can work with different modes and change from one to another fully automatically.

The unit works in this mode when the system requires only cold water production. It uses the finned coil as source-side heat exchanger and produces chilled water at exchanger, connected to the circuit dedicated to water distribution for only air conditioning in the building.

The unit works in this mode when the system requires only heating. It uses the finned coil as source-side heat exchanger and produces hot water at exchanger, connected to the circuit dedicated to water distribution for only heating in the building.

When there is a simultaneous demand for hot water and cold water in the system, the multi-functional unit behaves like a water/water heat pump, and manages condensation on exchanger heating and evaporation on exchanger cooling and therefore works simultaneously on the two hydronic circuits of the system.

The change from one configuration to another takes place fully automatically while trying to optimize the energy spent based on the demand from users.

Since all the units are also dual circuit, the recovery mode can be used on one circuit while the other works in cooling or heating mode, and this is essential to meet unbalanced hot/cold load demands and in any case obtain the maximum level of energy recovery.