In light of the Middle East’s increasing focus on energy-efficient, environmentally friendly cooling solutions, district cooling services have been widely adopted and implemented. This past year, ASHRAE has been involved in updating guidance and design for those systems.
During his State of ASHRAE Address during the 2018 ASHRAE Winter Conference in Chicago, Bjarne Olesen, Ph.D., Presidential/Fellow/Life Member ASHRAE, discussed the Society’s partnership with Emirates Central Cooling Systems Corporation (EMPOWER).
In the partnership, ASHRAE will provide design and operational guidance, help update the ASHRAE District Cooling Design Guide and develop a new District Cooling Operations Manual.
The update is expected to be published this year, while the new guide is expected to be published late this year or in early 2019, Olesen said.
To solicit expert guidance to address the region’s specific needs, ASHRAE organized a workshop for district cooling applications for designers and operators. The workshop was held at the Region-at-Large’s Chapters Regional Conference (CRC) last September in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
About 60 local experts attended the workshop that was a follow-up event to the District Cooling for Urban Development conference co-sponsored by ASHRAE and UN Environment.