UK: Hotel refurb

Citadines Hotel, Trafalgar

New chiller takes the heat off London apartment hotel guests

Citadines Trafalgar Square has 187 apartments, which are air conditioned by fan coil units with cooling and heating coils.

These are served by independent hot and cold water circuits, dating from the historic six-storey Northumberland Avenue building’s conversion from offices in the 1990s.

The heat of summer 2018 proved too much for the old chiller, sparking the decision to replace it with new technology.

New chiller takes the heat off London apartment hotel guests

Prompted by uncomfortable indoor conditions during a summer heatwave, a central London apartment hotel’s ineffi cient and ageing rooftop chiller was replaced by a high efficiency Daikin unit with a smaller footprint and opportunities for cloud-based monitoring and control.

The chillers were switched in winter, so there was no further inconvenience to Citadines guests. The old unit was removed and the Daikin unit craned into position during a brief two-hour weekend closure of Craven Street, at the rear of the V-shaped building.

Direct Cooling’s Nick Weymouth says: “Installation of the new chiller was a timely opportunity to flush out the cold water circuit and each of the fan coil units to improve the cooling performance even further.”

The 400kW Daikin EWAQ high-effi ciency chiller was chosen to optimise energy effi ciency while also minimising operating costs and environmental impact. The unit features high effi ciency hermetic multi-scroll compressors, enhanced condenser coil surface area and plate-to-plate evaporator with reduced pressure drops and low refrigerant charge.

Maintenance Manager Ray Klova

“The chiller was definitely at the end of its lifespan, so we approached Direct Cooling Services who had installed various Daikin solutions at some of our other properties. “We were impressed by the specifi cations of the Daikin EWAQ chiller and its extended warranty. It was the best option for our needs. We are now ready for the next heatwave.”

A latest generation MicroTech III controller provides monitoring and control functions required for an efficient and trouble free operation of the chiller. Software with predictive logic selects the most energy efficient combination of compressor load and electronic expansion valve position to maintain stable operating conditions and maximise chiller effi ciency and reliability.

Citadines Trafalgar Square is at 18-21 Northumberland Avenue, and is one of four Citadines sites in London operated by international Apart’hotel specialist

The Ascott Limited, a member of CapitaLand. The group has more than 73,000 units and 500 properties, in more than 130 cities across 30 countries.