Refrigeration Plant

York chiller no 3 viewed from above

The Refrigeration Plant contained the heavy machinery (Chillers) needed to provide chilled water to the building. This was used for air conditioning and cooling for the Print and Repro/Business Centre areas, the main computer room in West Block (W404) and other parts of West Block such as W416.

The Chiller Plant was connected to the Boiler House by a short passageway that also contained the large pipes serving the plant. The main plant floor area, adjacent to G core, was a double-height space one storey below lower ground but parts of the room, where the control equipment was located, were just part of the standard single-height lower ground floor level. Part of the ground floor courtyard was on the roof of the Refrigeration Plant and there was a hole cut in the concrete slab to allow for future placement of machinery.

The chillers themselves were large machines that were powered by electricity at 3.3 kV. They that extracted heat from the chilled water circuit on its return to the plant from the area it was used to cool. The chilled water return went into an evaporator, one of the largest parts of the chillers’ body, which was a heat exchanger containing numerous metal tubes (much like a boiler) and the heat was transferred to the refrigerant enclosed within the chillers’ internal circuit. The refrigerant was then compressed using a large centrifugal compressor that heated it up. It then went into the condenser, another large boiler-like heat exchanger, and the heat was absorbed by another completely separate water circuit. This circuit, known as the ‘condensate’, went to the Cooling Towers on the roof of K-F spur.

There was space on the main floor of the plant room for four chillers; however, there were only ever three installed as far as I know. The original chillers were made by Carlyle (later taken over by another company , Carrier). In 1994–95, the main compressor and motor were completely replaced on two of the three chillers with new equipment made by York. The main body (the two large evaporator and condenser heat exchangers) was retained and the new equipment attached on top of this. This was also an opportunity to replace the refrigerant with one less damaging to the ozone layer.

The third chiller was believed to have dated from the 1980s (but photos of this are elusive) was not rebuilt as far as I know.

The rebuilt chillers had an electronic control panel but all three were attached to a large metal box (larger than a wardrobe), one dedicated to each chiller, that contained equipment for starting the motors. There was also a large control console showing the water temperature and status of the pumps in the plant. There were also a lot of Belmos Peebles isolators/motor control panels similiar to the panels found in pretty much all the main plant rooms on site.

The upper part of the Refrigeration Plant contained some very large pipes and some pumps. Entering the plant involved ducking underneath or climbing over these! There were pumps (two I believe) for the chilled water and another two/three/four for the condensate. These were controlled by the aforementioned Belmos Peebles panels.

Last updated on Wednesday 2 January 2019 by GaryReggae