Government Regulations - News

Greenheck, a globally renowned company in manufacturing and distributing air movement, conditioning and control equipment, has announced that now they offer an option for its ceiling exhaust fan and ceiling radiation damper to be combined at the factory into one unit shipped ready to install. Model CRD-310WT ceiling radiation damper Model CRD-310WT, a UL Classified ceiling radiation damper for wood truss applications, can be factory-mounted to one of six Greenheck ultra-quiet SP-A fan models (...

The 2019 ASHRAE Student Design Competition and Applied Engineering Challenge winners have been announced. The competition recognizes outstanding student design projects, encourages undergraduate students to apply their knowledge of practical design of energy-efficient HVAC systems and promote teamwork. Forty two teams competed and 26 were judged at Society level. This year’s Design Competition focused on a new small hospital in Budapest, Hungary. The project involved building a new four-s...

Marley Engineered Products’ help in keeping gymnasiums, factories, outdoor malls and industrial buildings. The range also helps create better airflow during the stuffy winter months. Marley Engineered Products’ provides a line of ceiling fans. With a durable, contoured blade design, the fans are built for optimal temperature control, providing economic solutions for air distribution. Boasting the large and powerful motors in the industry, the fans provide maximum velocity coverage up...

The Heating and Hotwater Industry Council (HHIC) warn that the proposals in the Government consultation for the Energy Company Obligation (ECO3) threaten the livelihoods of thousands of heating and plumbing businesses. The consultation is seeking views on proposed changes to the current ECO3 scheme. This includes: Incorporating the TrustMark Government Endorsed Quality scheme (a result of Each Home Counts) into ECO3, as a route to demonstrating compliance with the most up-to-date relevant PA...

Reliable Controls® announces the release of the MACH-ProAir™ (MPA) version 8 controller. Engineered to exceed the specifications for a wide variety of Variable Air Volume (VAV) applications, the Reliable Controls MACH-ProAir is a fully programmable BACnet® Building Controller (B-BC) with numerous downloadable standard codes and flexible I/O options, all priced to meet a modest budget. The new revision F hardware for the MACH-ProAir and version 8 firmware, adds significantly more...

When it is published later this quarter, the 2019 edition of ASHRAE/IES 90.1, Energy Standard for Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings, will be the first standard, code, or regulation to use the new fan energy index (FEI) as the metric for efficiency provisions for commercial and industrial fans and blowers, Air Movement and Control Association (AMCA) International Inc., the developer of FEI, announces. Determined in accordance with ANSI/AMCA Standard 208-18, Calculation of the Fan E...

Panasonic has introduced Voice Control with the Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa interfaces, to its air conditioning portfolio. Panasonic’s solutions that are compatible with the Comfort Cloud app, including all its domestic air-conditioners and PACi systems, can now be voice-activated to provide simple and convenient control. Voice activation control This new functionality offers a wide variety of benefits for both the commercial and residential markets. For example, homeowners who are...

Reliable Controls® announced a new partnership with IR-TEC®. The IR-TEC product line consists of Passive Infrared (PIR), High Frequency Doppler (HFD) and Ambient Light Sensors (ALS) among others. These sensors are combined to make up a variety of ceiling and wall mount occupancy sensors, light sensors, and wall switching/sensing stations. IR-TEC offers products that are complementary to Reliable Control’s lighting controls line and will assist dealers to complete their lighting con...

Although women fill nearly half of all jobs in the U.S., they hold less than 25 percent of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) jobs, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. Nonprofit organization, Project Scientist is helping to close this gender gap by exposing a diverse population of young girls to STEM education. Project Scientist in partnership with Trane, globally renowned provider of indoor comfort solutions and services and a brand of Ingersoll Rand, hosted a group of...

Registration is open for the 2020 ASHRAE Winter Conference, to be held February 1-5 at the Hilton Orlando. Registration for the conference provides entry to the co-sponsored AHR Expo, held February 3-5 at the Orange County Convention Center. The ASHRAE Winter Conference features eight conference tracks, tours, social events and a keynote speech from retired NFL referee Ed Hochuli. The conference presents the latest topics in the HVAC&R industry through a technical program featuring more than...

ECR International has announced the release of a new video technical support tool to assist contractors in the field. This powerful new tool, called Rescue Lens, will enable ECR Technical Support advisors to see in real time exactly what the technician is seeing on the job site. ECR Rescue Lens The only requirement for the dealer is to have a smartphone with internet access either over cellular data or Wi-Fi Occasionally, a technical issue comes along that isn’t identified immediately....

Coastal Pacific Xpress (CPx) has been partnering with its customers and continually looking for ways to improve its offerings for more than 30 years. Specializing in meeting stringent just-in-time requirements, CPx provides flexible and tailored solutions that encompass truckload and less-than-truckload services, as well as the warehouse and distribution capacities needed for companies throughout North America. Assisting the Canadian-based company to provide even greater service value to custom...

The Big Ass Fans family continues to grow. The HVAC solutions company is excited to announce Watts Engineering Sales, Inc. as the distributor of Big Ass Fans products for the design and new construction market in Alabama. HVAC solutions expert WES Inc., a 100 percent employee-owned business, has provided expertise in the HVAC industry for more than six decades. From its creation in 1959 up till now, Watts has grown to exceed customer expectations by providing the highest quality products and c...

Airedale International, the British-based air conditioning solutions provider, has announced the launch of a new range of R32-optimized air conditioning products. Azure range The Azure range, which has been under development for almost two years at Airedale International’s state-of-the-art research and development facility, is the latest technological innovation from the UK manufacturer which was founded in 1974. The range has been optimized to operate at the same high level of output a...

Significant changes to refrigerant container color protocol will commence in January 2020, as outlined in the Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute’s (AHRI) Guideline N, Assignment of Refrigerant Container Colors. Guideline revisions, first published in 2015, specify that all refrigerant containers should have the same paint color, RAL 7044, to reduce confusion among similarly colored refrigerant containers. Preventing safety issues “Misidentifying refrigeran...

Around the world, people are flocking from rural areas to cities. By 2050, there will be more than six billion people living in megacities, twice as many as now. Over the same period, the volume of urban traffic is set to increase threefold, not least because the continuing boom in online commerce will feed further growth in delivery traffic. A denser population and more traffic mean deteriorating air quality. Across the globe, from Paris to Shanghai, major cities face an enormous challenge, wh...

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) have been evaluating energy use and environmental trends for many years. Although legislative organization began nearly a dozen years ago, trends have largely remained consistent. R-22, or HCFC-22, along with other refrigerants, is being phased out because of its impact on the environment, contributing to the depletion of the ozone layer. Shortly after the current president took office in 2017, the DOE established...

Air conditioning and commercial refrigeration major, Blue Star Limited, has won a prestigious air conditioning and tunnel ventilation system order valued at Rs.253 crores from Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL). AC, tunnel ventilation and environmental control system The scope of this order includes design, engineering, supply, installation and commissioning of the air conditioning, tunnel ventilation and environmental control system for nine underground stations and associated tunn...

“Evaporative cooling, direct, indirect, and two-stage solutions, are being used across the board in a wide variety of commercial and industrial solutions,” said Randy Niederer, Director of Marketing, Cambridge Engineering Inc. “It is currently experiencing a renaissance, as large manufacturing and distribution facilities are choosing this technology to provide cooling relief for employees.” This renaissance, along with several new technology factors, creates a backdrop f...

The European F-gas Directive is all about the restriction of fluorinated greenhouse gases, which includes hydro-fluorocarbons (HFCs), commonly used as refrigerants for air conditioning. This is a regulation that has been adopted by the European Union to phase-down the usage of refrigerants, which have a high Global Warming Potential (GWP). Since the most common refrigerants used (e.g. R410A, R134a), by individuals and industry wide, are affected by this regulation, there has been a drive lately...

Leading the change to R32, Panasonic has introduced the R32 Big PACi Series. The series, available in 20kW and 25kW capacities uses R32 refrigerant, includes a water heat exchanger option and supports Panasonic’s ‘full switch to R32’ initiative and Environmental Vision 2050. Business owners making the switch to R32 PACi can also benefit from energy and cost savings, thanks to a higher energy efficiency performance of up to 10% with R32. Due to the water heat exchanger connect...

The newly published HVAC Applications volume comprised of 65 chapters covering a broad range of facilities and topics was written to help engineers design and use equipment and systems described in other Handbook volumes. Main sections cover comfort, industrial, energy-related and general applications, as well as building operations and management. The 2019 edition includes three new chapters: Indoor Swimming Pools (Chapter 6) Indoor Airflow Modeling (Chapter 59) Occupant-Centric Sensing an...

Adcock is currently delivering another project for Selectaglaze, having been a customer since 2011 Selectaglaze had the confidence in Adcock to specify them as a preferred supplier. Drawing on years of experience and Diamond Quality Partner status Adcock designed and implemented a Mitsubishi Electric VRF Heat Recovery heat pump system. maintain existing services With its advanced controls and ability to heat and cool different parts of the building simultaneously the system was perfect for th...

Optimization of data center performance, increased tenant retention, agile communications between operations and upper management, and reduced costs are just some of the benefits available to a colocation data center provider as they pilot a cloud solution from ABB. With its unique holistic data center approach the solution provides a detailed insight into how multiple data centers and devices are performing. Increased accessibility with dashboards By bringing all the information into one pla...

Adcock was contracted to replace and upgrade the refrigeration system serving the hospital's main mortuary department. With a capacity of 72, it is a very busy department and it was vital to maintain operation during the upgrade. By careful planning and working closely with the hospital Adcock was able to achieve this. To minimize disruption some of the works was carried out overnight. Adcock maintains a refrigeration and air conditioning system at the hospital, together with decades of experi...

Schneider Electric, the provider in digital transformation of energy management and automation has been shortlisted for the award for best breakthrough in operations and performance at the Railway Industry Innovation Awards. Nominated for its Compact PSP - a product enabling customers to completely rethink how they approach signaling systems, Schneider Electric’s commitment to ensuring safety, security and reliability of rail networks has been recognized with this nomination. Signaling s...

Greenheck was recognized for excellence in product design in the 16th annual Dealer Design Awards Program sponsored by The Air Conditioning Heating & Refrigeration News magazine. An independent panel of contractors acted as judges in the contest that had 79 entries. The company’s Vari-Green® Drive with companion app was the Gold level winner in the Ventilation Products category. The ACHR News is a trade magazine in the heating, ventilating, air conditioning, and refrigeration indus...

Greenheck has added two new products to its automatic balancing damper (ABD) line. Model ABD-FD incorporates a UL 555 rated 1-1/2 or 3-hour static fire damper, flanged sleeve, an ABD and an optional factory-supplied grille. The entire ABD-FD assembly is UL rated and approved and can be used in both supply and exhaust applications. Ceiling radiation damper CRD-1WT, UL classified for wood truss floor/ceiling assemblies, now has the option to add an ABD mounted in the plenum box. Automatic balanc...

Depending on where one lives, summer’s energy bills can be as brutal as the temperature outdoors. Here are some simple things one can do to reduce their cooling costs: Close the shades and drapes. Keeping the sun out can reduce the temperature inside the home by several degrees. Use the unit’s fan settings wisely. When it’s humid, keep the unit’s fan running, even if the air conditioner is off. It will circulate the air and keep the surroundings more comfortable. Ceil...

Armstrong Fluid Technology announced an ECM Pump-Less-Volute, a new variable-speed version of the popular Gold Series Pump-Less-Volute. The new ECM Pump-Less-Volute uses a permanent magnet motor that is up to 40% more efficient than a standard induction motor. Armstrong Pump-Less-Volute kits (PLV) are a complete repair solution for Armstrong dry rotor S&H and 1050 & 1060 Series. Armstrong standard and ECM PLVs can also be used to re-build or upgrade select B&G or Taco circulator mod...