10 May 2022
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ICS Cool Energy has delivered customised process cooling solutions at the Nitta Corporation of Holland (Nitta) manufacturing plant in Alkmaar, Netherlands.
Nitta Corporation of Holland is part of the Nitta Group, and a global manufacturer of conveyor and transmission belts.
The collaboration started in 2018 when Nitta reached out to ICS Cool Energy team in the Netherlands for a temporary process chiller to enhance the summer capacity of its existing cooling system.
“Our production requires reliable, accurate process temperature control 24/7. With the increasing summer temperatures, we noticed that the existing system was not able to cope with the demand,” said Wim Keesman, maintenance manager at Nitta. “The ICS team quickly delivered and installed a process-dedicated chiller that allowed us to keep our operations running at optimal process temperatures throughout the Summer months. What we noticed during that rental period was that the i-Chiller was significantly outperforming our older, permanently installed chiller.”
Arno Eijkelboom, sales manager at ICS Cool Energy Netherlands, said: “Temperature and flow rate fluctuations can be challenging for traditional HVAC chillers installed on a manufacturing process, as they are primarily designed to cope with seasonal demands. The i-Chiller range has been designed specifically for industrial manufacturing processes and provide the control, reliability and reduced energy costs when compared to traditional units. Nitta had the chance to compare the performances in their own process.”
Experiencing positive outcomes from the i-Chiller’s operation during the summer rental, Nitta decided to keep the unit running on a long-term hire contract. After more than 24 months of operations, Nitta decided to completely replace their existing cooling system and build the new one around ICS Cool Energy i-Chillers.
“We evaluated the i-Chiller’s operations in our manufacturing environment for over a year and realised that building a new process cooling system based on this solution would be beneficial for our operations,” said Keesman. “Switching from the fixed-system approach to a long-term rental from ICS Cool Energy, has also given us the additional total cost of ownership benefits versus capital investment needed for a fixed asset.”
Following the Nitta’s decision, the ICS Cool Energy team calculated and designed a new system for the plant. The changes involved removing the heat exchangers and installing two i-Chiller 660 units with 135kW capacity each and additional temperature control units (TCU) to provide heat during the coating and lamination processes at the plant.
“We’re proud to have worked with Nitta on this project,” said Eijkelboom. “Staying close throughout the years we managed to demonstrate in their own manufacturing environment what it means that the i-Chiller was purposefully designed for such process applications. It has met the customer’s requirements for reliability, energy efficiency and performance giving them full temperature control over their process water to keep their operations running smoothly.”
All i-Chillers are certified by Eurovent and individually tested on the factory test rig to achieve and assure quality in-line with ISO 9001 and 14001 standards. A complete check of the refrigerant charge, leakage controls and microprocessor are completed before every delivery which offers a long-term sustainable standard of reliability.
