Heilig Hart Regional Hospital purchased Daikin air-cooled chillers in 2020. The units are positioned on the roof of its central building, for cooling the hospital and its critical equipment. These chillers are covered with a service contract, of which one chiller has an all-inclusive extended warranty contract. These contracts have Daikin on Site (DoS) connections to supervise the operation of the units and ensure fast service interventions.
Thanks to the advanced features of DoS, refrigeration leakage was detected on one chiller and the refrigerant was refilled within 3 weeks without affecting the normal operation of the unit.
About the Customer
Heilig Hart Regional Hospital was founded in 1899 in Leuven, Belgium. The hospital has about 800 staff, conducting more than 12.000 surgeries a year.
Daikin’s chillers are used for its operating quarters and office areas. There is back-up capacity, nevertheless, the customer wants to reduce potential downtime.
“System continuity is crucial for ensuring consistent and high-quality service to our patients. With Daikin’s solution and support, we are confident
about the sustainability and energy efficiency of our service and operation.“
Stijn Verplaetsen, Head of Technical Service at Heilig Hart Regional Hospital
Products installed
EWAD610TZXRB2018
EWAT155B-SRA2046
EWAH600TZXRD2 (coming March-April 2024)
Total cooling capacity: 750 kW
About the solution provided by Daikin
To satisfy the need of the customer, Daikin provided the following services:
Preventive Maintenance: 2 visits per year for the preventive major maintenance of the devices and comprehensive checks of the operation of the cooling circuits; 2 leak tests per year; a comprehensive oil analysis per compressor; and extended total warranty on all spare parts and interventions.
Daikin on Site Premium subscription, including leak detection: This means that Daikin engineers can monitor the installation on a daily basis, allowing fast interventions if needed.
Energy Optimization Report based on the operational data collected by DoS.
The Approach
The leak detection alarm from DoS platform indicated an abnormal behaviour. Based on Daikin on Site data, Daikin’s Remote Monitoring Engineer was able to evaluate the unit’s running conditions. However, due to low load conditions during winter period, no dedicated conclusion on refrigerant loss could be made.
Even without clear evidence for abnormal behaviour in the running data, Daikin wants to prevent as much as possible the environmental impact or the loss of cooling production for the customer. For this reason, we took a proactive approach to inform, inspect and repair.
The Daikin technician contacted the customer and scheduled an on-site inspection.
The results
From the on-site inspection, it was confirmed that a small leak was present. The leak resulted in a loss of 4kg of refrigerant on 39kg of total refrigerant in the unit, equivalent to 12% refrigerant lost. Without the leak detection feature, it would have taken months to detect this leak, at a much bigger cost for replacing refrigerant.
Highlights
Thanks to the advanced leak detection feature of Daikin on Site, Daikin was able to detect the leak, check the equipment, and refill the refrigerant in less than 3 weeks. The unit was repaired without any loss of cooling production.
About Daikin on Site
Daikin On Site (DoS) is cloud-based remote monitoring and control tool for chiller plants and air handling units.
DoS connection aims to assist our customers by providing real-time data access and storage, to support from Daikin experts and the possibility to identify cost-saving opportunities, to increase the lifetime of the unit and to reduce the risk of unexpected issues.
About Leak Detection Feature
The algorithm takes into account data related to the last 4 months of the unit’s operation. When refrigerant leak is detected, DoS promptly notifies the pre-specified end-user, installer and service engineer by the following means:
Alarm display on the DoS screen
Sending mail to a previously registered mail address
Complete the above notification within one minute of detecting the leak
The alarm can be cancelled if it is judged to be false.
What’s Next?
The refrigerant leak detection algorithm is constantly being improved by Daikin experts with increased accuracy and delpoyment in more units. The feature is available for EWAD-TZD, EWAT-B-C chillers and will be implemented on Daikin new chillers.
