Engineering Report: H321

Engineering Services
FAN 351

Johnson Controls, Inc.

Controls Group

507 E. Michigan Street CONTROL OF CENTRIFUGAL REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS

P.O. Box 423
Milwaukee, WI 53201

This report is intended as a guide in the application of proper control methods for
centrifugal refrigeration systems. Since the prime method of judging any
refrigeration system is by its output and since the output is determined by the
controls, the proper application of controls is important. Examples contained in this
report do not cover all possible applications but provide a sound basis for designing
a sound control system.

Two basic methods are used for controlling the output capacity of centrifugal
refrigeration compressors. First, and by far the most common, is the use of inlet
vanes on the suction side of the compressor to regulate the flow of gas into the
compressor. In addition to regulating the flow of gas into the compressor, the vanes
tend to give the gas a start on its rotation before entering the turbine wheel of the
compressor, thus preventing the wheel from doing its full amount of work on the
gas. Most centrifugal compressors may be modulated down to between 10 and 25
percent of full capacity by this method.

The second is by controlling the speed of the prime mover such as a steam turbine,
a gas engine, or a variable speed electric motor. Some chiller manufacturers will
combine speed and inlet vane control.

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OPERATING CYCLE

The cycle of operation of a typical centrifugal water chilling system is shown in figure
1. The chilled water (or brine) flows through tubes in the chiller (evaporator) where
heat is transferred to the refrigerant surrounding the tubes. The most common
refrigerants for centrifugal compressors are refrigerants 11 and 113.

Figure 1. Operating Cycle of Typical Centrifugal Water Chilling System

In absorbing heat from the chilled water, the primary refrigerant boils to a gas and is
pulled into the suction of the compressor. There it is compressed and discharged to
the condenser at a higher temperature and pressure. The condenser water, which is
in the tubes, absorbs heat from the high temperature gas and condenses the gas
into liquid. The liquid refrigerant then is returned to the chiller through a high
pressure float valve and the process is repeated. Cooling water for the condenser
normally is supplied from a cooling tower.

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CHILLER ENERGY CONSIDERATIONS

A primary candidate for chiller plant optimization can be found in the chilled and
condenser water supply temperatures. Either decreased condenser water
temperature or increased chilled water supply temperature will result in an increase
in chiller efficiency. As a general rule, the increase in efficiency for centrifugal
refrigeration machines that can be expected is 1 - 1.5% for each degree decrease in
condenser water temperature or each degree increase in chilled water supply
temperature. This factor of 1 - 1.5% per degree is only a typical value and will vary
based on condenser, evaporator and overall chiller plant design. The accompanying
graph shows the importance of chilled water and condenser water temperatures on
a typical chillers design performance. Other areas for Energy Conservation Control
investigation include chilled water temperature drift, cooling tower control and
multiple chiller sequencing.

Figure 2. Leaving Condenser Water Temperature (F)

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Condenser Water Control

The greatest potential for savings due to temperature reset of chillers occurs on the
condenser side of the machine.
While the increase in efficiency for a degree of temperature reset is approximately
the same for both the evaporator and the condenser sides, a greater amount of
reset is usually possible on the condenser side. As will be discussed later, chilled
water reset typically is limited to 3-5F with an unlikely maximum of 10F. However,
the condenser water circuit can frequently achieve 10-20F of reset.

Figure 3. Temperature Difference vs Energy

Chiller plants are usually sized to reject their rated tonnage through cooling towers
sized to operate at design outdoor wet bulb conditions. The leaving tower temper-
ature is primarily dependent on the outdoor ambient wet bulb temperature. The
tower is sized to cool this condenser water down (via evaporative cooling) to within
a certain number of degrees of ambient wet bulb. This design number of degrees is
known as the towers design approach or, how closely the condenser water can
approach the outdoor ambient wet bulb. The approach value for most towers is in
the 5-10F range. As ambient wet bulb drops from the design level, the condenser
water will also drop. Usually, there are controls installed to sense this lower temper-
ature and take the necessary actions (tower bypass or shutting off tower stages) to
keep the condenser water entering the chillers at its design temperature, normally
85F. This may save some tower fan horsepower, but it will force the chillers to con-
tinue rejecting their heat into a needlessly high temperature heat sink (namely 85F
entering condenser water). The savings being ignored at the chiller under these
conditions will far exceed the gains realized in tower fan horsepower.

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The obvious question at this point should then be Why not simply set the
condenser water tower controls to a lower level and save significant energy? Its
not quite that straight forward. The leaving tower temperature approaches the
ambient wet bulb; there is no one proper condenser water temperature setting. If,
for instance, a tower with a 5F approach were set to deliver 70F condenser water
and the ambient wet bulb was 72F, the best the tower could possibly achieve would
be 77F water temperature. The controls set for 70F would have all tower cells and
fans running at full speed, striving for an unattainably low condenser water
temperature. However, if this same tower were set for the proper level under these
conditions (77 - 78F) it could probably reach this setting while only using one half of
its rated capacity, this will prevent the wasting of tower horsepower.

The desired control method would be to vary the towers control point as the outdoor
ambient wet bulb changes. The setting should always equal the ambient wet bulb
value plus the towers approach value. This will result in a realistic condenser water
setting which will save as much energy as possible at the chiller through increased
efficiency, while not expending any more tower horsepower than is required.

Several means can be used to achieve this control strategy, but the most obvious is
probably not the most desirable. That would be using an outdoor wet bulb sensor to
reset the condenser water temperature set point. The difficulties of maintaining an
accurate outdoor wet bulb signal makes this method somewhat impractical. A more
desirable method is to use two outdoor ambient sensors, namely dry bulb and dew
point, and combine them to derive an outdoor wet bulb value. This calculated value
can be approximated by using standard hardware devices, but some
approximations must be made. The overall accuracy, however, is still better than
what could be obtained with the typical maintenance of most wet bulb sensors. The
controls required are quite standard, and the resulting scheme is a master (wet
bulb) resetting submaster (condenser water) control arrangement.

How low can condenser water temperatures be reset? Even though centrifugals are
usually designed for 85F condenser water they are designed to accept as low as
65F water under normal operating conditions. This does not include machine start-
up when the chilled water is likely to be quite warm. Centrifugal machines are
designed to pump against at least a minimum head. If the condenser and the chilled
water temperatures get too close together, this minimum head may not exist.
Typically 25F between leaving chilled water and leaving condenser water will
assure an adequate head. Without this head the chiller is likely to surge and may
experience internal lubrication problems. A common minimum temperature setting
for the condenser water which is acceptable to most everyone is 70F.

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CHILLED WATER CONTROL

As mentioned earlier, chiller efficiency can also be increased by increasing the

leaving chilled water temperature. Again, the ratio is approximately 1 - 1.5%
increase in efficiency for each 1F rise in water temperature. This does not mean
the chiller is performing less cooling or that the total temperature drop through the
chiller is any less. The chiller simply does not have to work as hard to lower the
water temperature from 58F to 48F as it does to lower the water temperature from
54F to 44F, even though both are 10F temperature drops.

Design leaving temperature for the chiller is just as the name implies only meant for
design load conditions. Full load conditions do not exist the majority of the time.
During these times, there is a good chance that design temperature is not
necessary and the chiller leaving water temperature can be raised. The maximum
call for cooling capacity can be obtained by comparing the signals being fed to the
cooling coil valves. The coil calling for the greatest amount of cooling can be
selected and this cooling requirement can be used to determine the necessary
chilled water temperature. Any time this cooling coil is not using full chilled water
flow, it implies that supply water of that low temperature is not needed. The chiller
temperature controller should then be reset to some higher value. If no cooling coil
calls for full chilled water flow at this new temperature setting, the controller should
again be reset to a higher temperature. The chilled water temperature should not be
readjusted downward until one of the cooling coils cannot produce sufficient cooling
to satisfy its load requirements. This condition can be sensed by observing any
cooling coil valve which is receiving a control signal beyond what should be required
for full chilled water flow to the coil. At this time, the chilled water controller should
gradually be reset to a lower temperature until all cooling coil valves are positioned
within their control ranges. All of these functions can be accomplished with standard
proportional acting temperature controls.

Another popular, but less desirable, method of chilled water reset is based on return
water temperature. The assumption made is that as the cooling load drops the
return chilled water temperature also drops. For this to be true the chilled water flow
must be constant. This means having a system with 3-way valves or a supply to
return bypass connection to maintain constant flow. A 2-way valve or variable flow
system will reduce its flow as the load drops, return temperature will not indicate
load. If the flow is constant, return temperature will indicate average plant load. If
the whole system load is homogeneous, this average may be acceptable. However,
many plants serve widely diversified loads where some areas may be fully loaded
while other areas are unoccupied and turned off (i.e.; Hospitals, Universities,
Computer Facilities, etc.).

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For these cases, if 25% of the complex were at full load and the other 75% lightly
loaded or OFF, return chilled water temperature would indicate a light load
condition and thus an elevated chilled water supply temperature. This high (i.e.; 48 -
50F) temperature supply would not satisfy the 25% of the load which needed full
cooling capacity (i.e.; design chilled water temperature).

This method of chilled water reset can be made to work if its weaknesses are
realized. If the whole buildings loads come and go uniformly this is a workable
approach. Its prime advantage is that it only requires one sensing point to determine
the chilled water supply temperature.

CHILLED WATER TEMPERATURE DRIFT

With fixed temperature chilled water systems an inherent feature of proportional

type control is that of set point drift. When applied to the chilled water temperature
controller, this will mean a downward drift in the control point as the load on the
machine decreases. If this controller is set to deliver design temperature chilled
water at design load conditions, this will be the highest temperature water ever
leaving the machine. The result will be a downward drift in set point as the load
decreases from 100%. This means operating at a lower machine efficiency during a
time when the load may be able to use higher temperature chilled water resulting in
an increase in machine efficiency.

Although this set point drift is unavoidable with proportional only controls, it can and
should be held to the lowest level possible. Adding a controller with Integral (reset)
action will eliminate this energy penalty due to proportional drift.

MULTIPLE CHILLER SEQUENCING

Centrifugal chillers operate most efficiently in the middle to upper portions 40 - 90%
of their design capacity range. The lowest input energy to output tonnage ratio
usually is between 50% to 60% of maximum tonnage. This mid-load range is also
the place where most chiller plants spend most of their time. Consequently,
selecting the right chillers to have on for any given load is quite important. In theory,
it is better to run two equal sized chillers at 50% load each rather than only one at
100% capacity. This, however, ignores the horsepower consumed by any pumps
which must be started with the second chiller. This pumping horsepower could
consume more energy than the second chiller saves by being in a more efficient
part of its part load performance characteristic. The type of plant must be analyzed
before a judgment can be made as to which chillers should run to satisfy certain
loads.

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The pumping horsepower required for each additional machine is the primary
determining factor. Generally, series piped chillers have good potential because the
second machine does not require any additional pumping horsepower.
Primary/secondary pumping systems are reasonably good candidates because the
primary pumps which are interlocked to the chiller are usually quite small. Since
they only have to move water through the small primary loop within the equipment
room. Plants which use the chiller pumps to distribute the chilled water throughout
the whole system are less likely to show good possibilities for energy savings via
chiller sequencing.

TYPICAL CONTROL ARRANGEMENTS

Control Of A Single Compressor System

Figure 4 is a typical control diagram for a water chilling system using one single-
stage centrifugal compressor. This compressor is controlled by modulating the inlet
vanes to determine capacity. As mentioned previously, these vanes regulate the
flow and direction of refrigerant gas entering the compressor.

Figure 4. Automatic Control of Single Compressor

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The primary control for this arrangement is a receiver-controller and transmitter with
the transmitter in the leaving chilled water line. Receiver-controller TCR-1, positions
the compressor inlet vanes in response to a change in leaving chilled water
temperature. On a rise in chilled water temperature, TCR-1 passes air to actuator
DA-1 which opens the vanes and allows the compressor to operate at a higher
capacity. The inlet vanes are normally closed; that is, with no force applied they are
in the closed position. The automatic reset relay R-1 is shown in the control air line
from TCR-1. This is an optional item and is incorporated only to eliminate offset.

The load limiting relay with remote set point adjuster is provided in the circuit to limit
the output capacity of the machine. Load limiting relay, R-2, may be adjusted to
operate at any capacity. R-2 may be located either in the supply air line to the pilot
positioner or in the air line connecting the pilot positioner to the actuator. R-2 limits
the input air signal to actuator DA-1 in response to the amount of current being
drawn by the compressor motor.

When the compressor is operating at less than full capacity or less than the setting
of R-2, the motor is drawing less than its normal amount of current. As the amount
of motor current being drawn approaches the setting of remote setpoint adjuster, the
load limiting relay limits the amount of air supplied to the actuator. This causes the
vanes to modulate toward the closed position until the motor current is decreased to
the setting of the relay. This limits the refrigeration capacity of the compressor and
at the same time prevents the motor from overloading or exceeding any set value.

To insure no load starting, a solenoid air valve E/PV-1, which is wired to the
compressor motor starter circuit, is put into the air line supplying the actuator. When
the compressor is not running, air is not supplied to the actuator and the inlet vanes
are closed. Compressor manufacturers normally supply a time delay relay in the
starter circuit so that E/PV-1 is not energized until several seconds after the
compressor has started. This assures that the compressor starts with the vanes
closed and does not start under load.

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Control Of Two Compressors With Chilled Water Piped In Parallel

Figure 5
Two compressors with chilled water piped in parallel is shown in figure 5. This
method uses one controller, TCR-1 controlling from a single temperature sensor
(TT-1) located in the common chilled water output of both chillers. The controller
produces a constant leaving water temperature by modulating actuators DA-1 and
DA-2. When one compressor shuts down, however, the other must subcool the
water in its circuit to maintain a constant temperature, thereby decreasing its
efficiency.

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As shown in Figure 9, TCR-1 controls the capacity of the two compressors in

parallel. The operation chart in figure 6 shows the control sequence of two
compressors piped in parallel. The lead compressor starts through pressure-electric
switch P/ES-1 and under control of TCR-1 loads to 100 percent capacity. Selection
of the lead compressor is made by a selector switch. On a further rise in load the
second compressor is started by pressure-electric switch P/ES-2 at 90 percent
capacity. Both compressors drop into the modulating range to maintain a constant
leaving water temperature.

Figure 6. Operation Chart

On a decrease in system load to approximately 40 percent of total capacity,
compressor No. 2 is cut off by P/ES-2 and the entire load is carried by compressor
No. 1. On a further decrease in system load, compressor No. 1 modulates down to
approximately 10 percent of its capacity and is cut off by P/ES-1.

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Changing starting sequence for machines controlled in this manner requires manual
or electrical resetting of the control apparatus. Electrical selection is shown in Figure
7.

Figure 7. Electrical Selection of Lead Compressor

Parallel Control Of Two Compressors With Chilled Water Piped In Series

Figure 8

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In dual compressor installations another method is to pipe the chillers in series as

shown in Figure 8. The chilled water temperature controller TCR-1 has its
transmitter located in the leaving chilled water after the second chiller and controls
the capacity of both machines by modulating actuators DA-1 and DA-2. The
operation chart in figure 6 shows the control sequence of two compressors piped in
series. The lead compressor starts through pressure-electric switch P/ES-1 and
under control of TCR-1 loads to 100 percent capacity. Selection of the lead
compressor is made by a selector switch. On a further rise in load the second
compressor is started by pressure-electric switch P/ES-2 at 90 percent capacity.
Both machines drop into the modulating range to maintain a constant leaving water
temperature. On a decrease in system load to approximately 40 percent of total
capacity, compressor No. 2 is cut off by P/ES-2 and the entire load is carried by
compressor No. 1. On a further decrease in system load, compressor No. 1
modulates down to approximately 10 percent of its capacity and is cut off by P/ES-1.

Figure 9. Automatic Control of Two Compressors

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TWO-STAGE COMPRESSORS
The previous descriptions of operation apply to a single-stage refrigeration
compressor. Control for a two-stage centrifugal machine is basically the same.
Some manufacturers connect the inlet vanes on the first and second stages
together with one external control arm for operation of both sets of vanes. Other
manufacturers provide two control arms for the vanes, one for the first and one for
the second stage. In this case, two actuators are required, and the load limiting
relay would be put in the control air line from the thermostat, ahead of the pilot
positioners. This would be the only change in the control diagrams shown.
Two pilot positioners are used. The pilot for the second stage should be set to begin
operation at a slightly lower control air point than the pilot for the first stage. For
example, if the first stage is set to operate over a 5 to 15 pound range, the second
stage should be set over a 3 to 15 pound range. This permits the second stage to
begin opening a little before the first stage, thereby reducing the possibility of
compressed gas from the first stage being forced against the second-stage inlet
vanes and making them hard to open. If the second-stage pilot is not set slightly
ahead, the force on the second-stage inlet vanes caused by gas from the first stage
can be considerable and give erratic operation of the second vanes.

SPEED CONTROL

When speed control is applied to centrifugal compressor systems, the control

diagrams are basically the same except that actuators are not required. Since the
method of speed control used depends upon the types of equipment furnished, it is
best to check with the manufacturer of the prime mover for recommended speed
control. On steam turbines probably the most common method is to control an oil
valve which, in turn, regulates a hydraulic governor arrangement on the turbine.

SUPPLY WATER RESET

Figure 10 shows the effect of proportional drift on chilled water temperature.

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Figure 10. Proportional Drift Control

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The first example in figure 10 shows standard proportional control. As the load is
reduced from 100 percent of chiller capacity, the set point drifts downward. To
counteract this, zone signals are added and the set point is raised so that the actual
chilled water temperature remains constant. Carrying this one step further, the set
point can be raised sufficiently higher so that as the load decreased, the chilled
water temperature increases. This will allow chillers to run much more efficiently.

CONDENSER WATER RESET

As mentioned earlier, outside wet bulb is the most desirable method for controlling
condenser water temperature. By resetting the condenser water temperature as
outside air wet bulb changes, the optimal amount of tower horsepower is used while
running the chiller at a high efficiency.

Figure 11. Condenser Water Reset Control

Outside wet bulb is not a simple condition to measure. Figure 11 shows an old way
to approximate wet bulb reset using proportional controls. Advancements in digital
control systems make calculation of wet bulb a straightforward proceedure and the
logical method to use.

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