Passive cooled cabinet / shelter for petrochemistry and refinery
INTERTEC-Hess
Equipment builders designing for arid climates have always faced considerable environmental protection problems. Traditional cooling techniques require a reliable power supply, which often poses difficulties and adds significant costs. Although solar cells and air conditioning techniques are making progress, their relative lack of efficiency, together with the problems of battery lifecycles in hot climates, continue to make protection complicated and expensive.
One of the most influential weapons in the battle to protect remote electronics against high temperatures has been passive cooling. The swing between day and night temperatures in arid and desert climates can be used to reduce temperature fluctuations by means of water (or other fluid). The coolness of the night can be absorbed by a fluid with a high capacity - like water - and then used to cool the equipment during the heat of the day. Heat exchangers and a fluid cycle transports the dissipated heat to the ambient. This approach can be a good choice for larger requirements such as shelters.
INTERTEC has now extended the application range of this approach by using the 'phase change' principle involved to freeze/thaw novel phase change materials (PCMs) offering higher melting/solidifying points. This makes passive cooling both viable and attractive for smaller remote equipment enclosures such as pipeline instrumentation, RTUs, etc.
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