Plant Room Cooling

[Double V]

Hi All

An interesting question was raised during a meeting with a large local retailer here in South Africa. They questioned the value of plant room cooling & whether or not it was necessary?

I know previously contractors would simply run an extraction fan but that would create a lot of issues with dust. This is easily solved with filters.

This trend changed to the landlords installing the plant room cooling, but now the contractors are tapping off the racks & of course the retailers ar not happy with the additional energy usage.

Please can I have your comments on the reasons why plant room cooling is necessary?

Thanks
Double V

[Tesla]

Hi DoubleV
I was taught - back when open drive comps were the norm. That the plant room must always be kept on a positive pressure, the volume removal rate was less than the input from the condensers. This is how we minimised the dust. That's my five cents worth.

[NoNickName]

Plant room cooling is not necessary if the highest temperature along the year is below the maximum temperature allowed by any single component.
Otherwise cooling may be necessary only at those time of the year when the room temperature exceeds the max allowed temperature.
I tend to favour closed circuit cooling, then fan extraction or admission, but the room temperature is generally not an issue up to 40°C or more.

[Brian_UK]

Check the maximum temperature allowed for any high level electrical cabling.

[Eeram]

Being serving large food retail groups, all our plantrooms are equipped with plantroom air conditioning that keeps a constant temperature of 22 deg. C.

Most of them runs on a seperate system. The rest are tapped from the existing packs/racks, if capacity allows. All equipment in the plantroom, including electricals, benefit from lower temperatures and nobody has ever questioned this on a energy saving issue. The equipment can run at peak performance. This is only true for plantrooms with remote condensers. With conventional simplex units, ventilation fans are used, with normal outside air.

The plantrooms are clean inside, because no ventilation from the outside is used.

[lowcool]

double v take some gym equipment in their and work out for for a few hours especially on 40 deg c day,ahh dont forget plenty of water and an oxy torch

[750 Valve]

Check the maximum temperature allowed for any high level electrical cabling.

Spot on, and also electronic controls manufacturers....

Danfoss AK-255 controllers are only rated to 40C ambient - so throw a swbd in a 40C plantroom and they are out of their design limits.

I am a big fan of A/C in plantrooms, not to 22 deg as I think its overkill but to keep machinery and swbds at an acceptable temp (say 28 to 30C max)

[Peter_1]

I only can agree with most posters, the most temperature fragile component determines if cooling is needed, PCB's, PLC's, cables,....

For Belgium, I can add that someone can refuse to work in an environment when it's hotter than - I think - 35 °C. If it's hotter than - I think 30 °C - then fresh water must be given to the workers, at least 1 l/hour. You then sometimes see workers going home with 5 bottles of unused water

[Double V]

Hi All

Thanks for the posts, I think it has come out as pretty self explanatory. I've always beleived a stable atmosphere makes for stable performance from the equipment. Although I do like Lowcool's idea of a gym in the plantroom. Keep them beer slugging mechanics in good shape!