Optimising performance in steady state for a supermarket refrigeration system

Using a supermarket refrigeration system as an illustrative example, the paper postulates that by appropriately utilising knowledge of plant operation, the plant wide performance can be optimised based on a small set of variables. Focusing on steady state operations, the total system performance is shown to predominantly be influenced by the suction pressure. Employing appropriate performance function leads to conclusions on the choice of set-point for the suction pressure that are contrary to the existing practice. Analysis of the resulting data leads to a simple method for finding optimal pressure set-point for given load situations.