German manufacturer GEA has reached 150 ammonia/NH3 (R717) heat pump installations around the world, according to Thomas Lergenmueller, Product Manager for Heat Pumps at GEA Heating & Refrigeration Technologies, in a presentation at the ATMO World Summit on March 30.
The ATMO World Summit was organized by ATMOsphere, publisher of Ammonia21.com.
While most of the ammonia heat pump installations so far are located in Europe, said Lergenmueller, GEA is also experiencing increasing interest in North America, as revealed by GEA Application Manager Kenneth Hoffmann during a presentation at the IIAR 2022 Conference earlier in March in Savannah, Georgia (U.S.).
The growing interest in natural refrigerant heat pumps, and in ammonia units in particular, has inspired GEA to launch new products that increase the capacity of the company’s ammonia portfolio and make it suitable for a wider range of industrial applications.
The RedGenium ammonia heat pump
In October of last year, GEA introduced the RedGenium, a new high-temperature ammonia heat pump capable of delivering 95°C (203°F). This heat pump is equipped with an XHP reciprocating compressor, the largest in GEA’s Grasso V ammonia compressor series, giving the RedGenium almost double the capacity compared to GEA’sprevious models, the company said at the time. The XHP is commercially available.
GEA is also now also bringing the RedGenium to the North American markets, with the company’s manufacturing plant in Pennsylvania already having completed the first two ammonia heat pumps for installation with an unnamed Canadian customer.
“The new GEA solution ideally complements the existing heat pump portfolio, as it is perfectly suited for many processes with high heat-load requirements, including applications in the food, beverage and dairy industries,” the company said at the launch of the RedGenium. “The temperature level also meets the criteria for space heating, district and local heating networks.” GEA touts “best efficiency in class” for the technology behind the RedGenium, ensuring the heat pump has reduced energy consumption and a “significantly improved ROI” for users.
Combining heating and cooling
Another technological innovation presented by Lergenmueller during the ATMOsphere World Summit was the new GEA Blu-Red Fusion. The Blu-Red Fusion is a combination of GEA’s Blu ammonia chillers for the low stage and GEA’s Red heat pumps for the high stage.
The Fusion is particularly suited for combined cooling and heating applications with high-temperature lifts between heat source and heat sink, where single-stage compression would otherwise be inefficient or impossible. It is suitable for the food, dairy and beverage industries, and “ideal” for cooling and heating applications such as hot water washdowns for abattoirs or pasteurization processes, according to GEA.
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