Page 32 - Industrial Technology October/ November 2020 issue

DESIGN ENGINEERING

OFF-GRID COOLING

ENCLOSURES, CABINETS AND FANS

AN INNOVATIVE FIELD SHELTER IS DELIVERING AN OFF-GRID
COOLING SOLUTION FOR A REMOTE DESERT BASESTATION
field equipment shelter fitted with fault-tolerant means that the basestation is far from the
cooling is ensuring the reliability of a wireless electricity grid, and must be powered by solar
communications link that connects instrument- energy. The passive cooling system, based on
Aation on a new gas pipeline crossing a Middle a water tank with internal and external heat
Eastern desert to the remote control room. Fabricated from exchangers, exploits the desert climate’s daily
tough glassfibre-reinforced polyester (GRP) materials, the temperature swing to store the coolness of
shelter houses a TETRA basestation powered by solar the night and use it to moderate internal
panels – in order to function reliably in an off-grid location temperatures during the day. The water
some 50 km from the nearest town. circulates around the system by natural
Intertec’s shelter employs a ‘hybrid cooling’ system to convection, without electrical power or
safeguard the 56m 2 shelter’s electronics equipment, and moving parts.
battery power storage compartment – a Zone 1 area. The
system consists of a water-based passive cooler assisted Increased efficiency The water coolers are a new variant of Intertec’s novel
by dual-redundant electrically-powered water coolers. This This system alone manages the shelter’s cooling needs Hybricool range that operate directly from a DC power
approach combines the intrinsic reliability of passive during the winter months – typically keeping temperatures supply, making them an efficient solution for solar-
cooling with active water refrigeration to increase cooling at around 18-20°C. The two powered water coolers powered installations. These cooling units are specially
efficiency on hot days. increase the efficiency of the cooling system during the designed to supplement passive coolers operating in
The system can handle a cooling load of around 1.9 hottest months – operating in an alternating sequence for process plants, with a heat exchanger element that can be
kW, ensuring that even during this Middle Eastern fault tolerance – typically maintaining temperatures in the installed inside the water storage tank of a passive cooling
climate's summer – when ambient temperatures can climb 20-30°C range. Even if both water coolers were to fail, system to decrease temperature. This interior element is
as high as 55°C – interior shelter temperatures will always Intertec's passive system has enough cool water capacity isolated from the rest of the externally-mounted
stay below a worst-case peak of around 35°C. At other to maintain low shelter temperatures for many days, giving refrigeration system, making it both an efficient and
times of the year, internal shelter temperatures are maintenance staff plenty of time to access the remote site economic solution for explosion proof applications.
maintained far below these levels. The remote location and make repairs. MORE INFORMATION: www.intertec.info

Enclosure Climate Control

Whatever the scale......

......we have the solution

ENCLOSURES POWER DISTRIBUTION CLIMATE CONTROL