Renewable technology is currently quite rightly at the heart of all aspects of the modern mechanical services industry. Fossil fuels are running out and natural gas in particular is a technology that while still current, is looking at a limited future.
Almost all enquiries seen by our estimating department are now based on renewable technologies, mainly based around Heat Recovery of waste heat lost during the extract/return air cycle of any installation. In addition to this, almost all motors in equipment are driven by inverter technology, giving peak performance at the lowest possible cost in energy usage.
All services supplied by Southern Ductwork Services now comprise of at least one of the following aspects, if not more:
- Air Source Heat Pump Units – ASHP units recover heat from external fresh air and transfer it to the heating medium
- Ground Source Heat Pump Units – GSHP units recover heat from underground boreholes where the temperature is a constant 12 degrees and transfer this into the heat medium
- Thermal Wheel Equipment AHUs – Fitted internally to AHUs, Thermal wheels recover heat from extract air and pass onto incoming air, recovering as much as 75% of wasted heat.
- Plate Heat exchangers – fitted in smaller AHUs. Plate heat exchangers recover heat from extract air and pass onto incoming air, recovering as much as 60% of wasted heat.
- Inverter drives on motors – Allows motors to ‘Soft Start’, without the current and large cable sizes required to start fixed speed motors. Motor will only run as hard as it needs to to keep optimum efficiency.
- Energy saving control systems – Controls include night set back, PIR controls on fan coils and dampers etc. This ensures energy usage and wastage is kept to an absolute minimum.
The delivery method of MVHR ventilation systems is almost exclusively either galvanised steel ductwork or, as is now becoming more common, UPVC plastic ductwork, especially in domestic Heat Recovery/MVHR systems. SDS ltd are vastly experienced in the design, supply installation and commissioning of MVHR systems, both galvanised steel and UPVC plastic ducting systems.
In addition to the environmental benefits of heat recovery/inverter driven systems there is a huge running cost benefit to the client also. In some cases the systems installed can literally pay for themselves in a very short space of time in savings over the running cost of an older fixed speed type system. On request a running cost comparison sheet can be provided to illustrate these savings.
All of the above energy saving practices and many more are in common usage now and are standard equipment on almost all equipment designed, supplied and installed by Southern Ductwork Services Ltd.