Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
(OP)
Has anybody designed a sea water cooling system for HVAC use? I'm working on a project with year round cooling demand (150 tons) and very high electricity cost. Beacuse of proximitey, I'm entertaining the idea of using sea water for heat rejection. My initial questions are how to arrange the inlet pipe. What material must be used for the pipeline? Would HDPE work or do I need exotics, CuNi / Stainless? Should I go off shore to very deep 40-50F water (more $) or keep the pipe close to shore and use the 60-80F water(less $?) to run a chiller at very low kW/TON? Can I avoid major marine construction/mobilization if I keep the intlet & oulet near shore? What protection do I need to provide for the inlet and outlet pipes? Any thoughts are appreciated.





RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
the idea sounds pretty good, if you jsut had the 40-50°F water you only needed an HX... so I think it is not that easy or veryone woudl do it.
I'f think maintaining the inlet will be some work so the marine life doesn't use it as a cave to live in etc.
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
My past applications have been both seawater as well as freshwater lake applications and we ran the seawater through the condenser bundles of the chillers and then dumped the seawater back out some distance away from the tidal zone. Seawater is commonly used in ship and submarine cooling applications, so research Naval design material.
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
It was done recently for this data cetner
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
> corrosion
> fouling
> protection from damage, both land and seaborne vehicles, people, and animals
> efficiency losses due to meeting regulatory requirements
> additional maintenance personnel
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RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
Regular cleaning anyhow should be part of cost planning and included in design specs. Yes, it means divers who make cleaning every one-two-three or whatever needed number of months.
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
Nobody had a problem with us drawing cooling water from the canal, but everybody, including the Corps of Engineers and the EPA and every local AHJ, had a huge problem with us discharging the very same water, just a few degrees warmer, back into the same canal.
Said facility has not yet materialized, and probably won't.
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
HTH
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
the only problem seems to be cost of electricity. what is the cost of other fuels in your area? fuel oil? natural gas? propane? water? you can use any of these fuels for electricity. WHAT IS YOUR CLIMATE?
you could have a dedicated generator as a prime power using oil or natural gas. This may prove less expensive than running your system into the sea.
If you are in a somewhat dry climate, you could eliminate the chiller and use evaporative cooling - such as Indirect/Direct type and it should reduce your energy substantially, to a point where your problem goes away altogether.
Just saying.
RE: Sea Water for HVAC Cooling?
Piping could be HDPE.
Go below the low tide line.
Look at local environmental laws and codes.
Filtration.
These are some of the key issues.
Need to probably look at de-scaling more frequently