Conference Agenda

Climate change and the associated temperature rising obliges cold chain to work under more adverse conditions, increasing the risk related to malfunctions or failures of refrigeration apparatus and systems, especially those corresponding to commercial refrigeration, where plug-in cabinets are often used. To reduce failure risk, automated fault detection and diagnosis methods represent a very interesting approach as malfunctions can be immediately detected or even prevented. However, such methods were historically based on large amount (high frequency) of data produced by multiple sensors that are often difficult to install in real commercial refrigeration systems. The current paper presents an automated fault detection and diagnosis system based on artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms that is specifically designed to be incorporated into low-cost internet of things (IoT) temperature controller devices. Those IoT controllers involve limited temperature sensors and low data register frequency. The purpose of the system is to detect and prevent common commercial refrigeration apparatus faults without increasing typical installation complexity.

This study examines the current energy use across sectors and segments of the Norwegian onshore seafood industry, with a focus on farmed fish, as well as pelagic, shrimp and whitefish from capture fisheries. Data on specific energy consumption, production, and exports were collected from open sources, reports, industry communications and site inspections. Extrapolation methods were applied to estimate the overall energy use across the subsectors. The findings reveal a significant dependency on fossil fuels in some sectors. Thermal processes, including refrigeration and heating, are the largest contributors to energy consumption, making these systems a priority for energy efficiency strategies. Rising temperatures, particularly of seawater, could have significant implications not only for marine life but also for the performance of thermal energy systems. Implementing energy efficiency measures is crucial for adaptation, and this work identifies and describes several such measures tailored to the seafood industry.

The rising global temperatures associated with global warming enforce to reduce the emissions from heating and cooling systems. Conventionally, the refrigeration and space heating demand of a supermarket is catered by the refrigeration system and the natural gas fired/electric boiler, respectively. The environmental and economic advantage of replacing these systems with a conventional booster CO₂ refrigeration system with heat recovery and an integrated heat pump (CB_HP) were analysed in this study. The variation in ambient temperature, electricity price, heat selling price and heating and refrigeration demand of the supermarket on a cold day in Stockholm (Sweden) were considered for the analysis. The results show that the total emissions and operating cost could be reduced by 94 % and 91 % as the conventional systems were replaced by CB_HP, respectively. Furthermore, the optimization of the economic performance of CB_HP for varying gas cooler pressure and temperature is carried out.

The effect of climate change on cold storage facilities will be evident in several different ways, including increased heat load on the plant, reduced capacity of the refrigeration system, impaired efficiency, higher energy costs and increased business risk resulting from all of the above. If the plant is already old and in a poor state of repair the additional stresses on operation could be substantial. Modifying older plant to account for these factors can increase the risk of premature failure. The business risk can be mitigated by adding refrigerating capacity modules to the facility without making any changes to the existing system and without sinking significant additional capital into an aged plant. This paper presents the factors to be considered when contemplating this type of problem and provides a case study of a beneficial project which enabled a cold store operator to spread the capital requirement over several years while gaining the benefits of improved reliability and reduced energy costs.