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WHAT’S A COMMERCIAL REFRIGERATION CONDENSER RETROFIT?

10/16/23

An air-cooled condenser is the equipment located outside the building that uses fans to reject the heat absorbed in the refrigeration system. It is made up of coils carrying the refrigerant, as well as multiple fans that move air across these coils, to transfer heat from the refrigerant to the ambient outside air.

Traditionally, condenser fans are constant speed and can only be turned on or off individually, when there is a need to reduce capacity during colder weather. This causes the fans to continually cycle on and off, resulting in system instability and wasted energy.

Retrofit systems, such as KE2 Therm Solutions – KE2 Fan Control, can improve this control by using variable frequency drives (VFDs) that allow all the fans to continue to operate at lower speeds. This not only leverages the fan affinity laws to save significant energy, but also helps protect the motors through “soft start.” It also reduces fan cycling while stabilizing discharge pressures – lessening compressor wear and use. Because these systems operate in part load conditions for most their annual runtime, condenser fan energy can be reduced by ~50%.