NATIONAL GRID FINDS SOLUTION IN THE PANASONIC ECO-G

07/06/2013

When an ailing chiller system serving the National Grid’s Hinckley critical call centre required replacing, Panasonic distributor, Oceanair, specified the Panasonic ECO-G gas heat pump in order to provide a reliable and cost-effective solution.

“The Hinckley plant houses the highly important gas leak call centre that runs 365 days a year, 24 hours a day,” explains Tony Evanson of Oceanair. “It was therefore crucial for the system to not only be dependable, but also be highly energy efficient.”

The Panasonic ECO-G system, available in 12-50HP models, is capable of providing 40kW of power, the equivalent power required for 48 indoor units. As a gas-driven VRF system, the ECO-G decreases the demand for electricity, making it the ideal solution where power restrictions apply.

“The ECO-G system installed allowed for more efficient control and performance,” explains Jeff Fleming from Pick Everard, installers of the project. “With the highest reliability rate, the ECO-G ensures individual and efficient control and performance. This is a far more convenient method, and reduces the overall consumption of the unit, removing unnecessary wastage that would result from more traditional air conditioning systems.”

The National Grid site’s existing system of two chillers was replaced by seven Panasonic ECO-G’s. This technique of using multiple systems provides a much higher resilience compared to only one or two units. If a fault in one arises, the combination of heat pumps ensures that it is able to provide continuity of service.

Paul Sibson of National Grid comments: “The new ECO-G system installed on site has been a very straight forward transition. Not only do the units provide continuous service to the site, they have also allows the costs involved in running the units to be significantly reduced – a huge benefit to us. And, as experienced recently, the system is very robust, surviving a real battering with golf-ball sized hail, without inflicting on the heat pumps performance at all. Due to the success of the installation, I will definitely seek to use this technology and its advances in the future.”