Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Applied Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Environmental performance and economic analysis of all-variable speed chiller

systems with load-based speed control
F.W. Yu *, K.T. Chan
Department of Building Services Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 30 November 2007
Accepted 5 August 2008
Available online 12 August 2008
Keywords:
Water-cooled chiller
Simulation
Variable speed
Electricity and water consumption

a b s t r a c t
There are increasing views on implementing all-variable speed chiller plants in place of conventional
constant speed plants. Supporters of these views claim that all-variable speed chiller systems can operate
much more efciently at part load in response to changes in building cooling load. This paper introduces
load-based speed control for all-variable speed plants to optimize their environmental performance.
Thermodynamic-behaviour chiller system models were developed to perform environmental assessment
(in terms of annual electricity and water consumption) for typical constant speed and all-variable speed
chiller systems operating for the cooling load prole of a local ofce building. Operating cost differences
between the two systems were calculated and compared in an economic analysis. Applying load-based
speed control to the variable speed chiller plant can decrease the annual total electricity use by 19.7%
and annual water use by 15.9% relative to the corresponding constant speed plant. The signicance of this
study is to provide more insights into how to make chiller systems more sustainable.
2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Central chiller plants have long been used to provide cooling energy for comfort air conditioning at the expense of considerable
electricity. Where water-cooled heat rejection systems are concerned, each plant contains multiple chillers, chilled water distribution pumps, condenser water pumps and cooling towers. For
many existing chiller plants, variable speed applications are limited to the tower fans and secondary-loop chilled water pumps if
the plant employs a primary/secondary pumping system. It is
worth widening the use of variable speed drives (VSD) for all the
components in order to make chiller systems operate as efciently
as possible. According to Crowther and Furlongs study [1], applying VSD to cooling tower fans with optimized control could make a
58% improvement in system energy performance, relative to the
equivalent system but with on/off fan control and a xed condenser water temperature set point. They addressed challenges
of varying the ow of condenser pumps during part load conditions
and indicated that the increased condenser water temperature
range under the reduced ow conditions could inuence the chiller
work, tower heat transfer effectiveness, and the system as a whole.
There are some studies focusing on applying VSD individually to
the chillers, chilled water pumps and condenser water pumps.
Qureshi and Tassou [2] made a review on the use of VSD for chiller
systems. They conrmed that VSD has been applied successfully to
perform capacity modulation for chiller compressors. The VSD
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +852 3746 0416; fax: +852 2364 7375.
E-mail address: ccyufw@hkcc-polyu.edu.hk (F.W. Yu).
1359-4311/$ - see front matter 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2008.08.003

chillers bring about superior part load efciency compared with

chillers using multiple constant speed compressors with cycling
control. Some major manufacturers have launched VSD chiller
products but many modern central cooling plants tend to be designed with a hybrid of variable and constant speed chillers. The
idea of using all-variable speed chillers in a multiple-chiller plant
is not fully implemented by traditional system designers. Bahneth
and Peyer [3] conducted extensive research on the application of
variable primary ow for chillers. They carried out parametric
modelling studies on chilled water pumping system alternatives
and found that the variable ow, primary-only pumping systems
could reduce the total annual plant energy use by 25%, rst cost
by 48%, and life cycle cost by 35% relative to the equivalent primary/secondary systems in which the primary loop is served by
constant speed pumps and the secondary loop by variable speed
pumps. They also pointed out that more solid data are required
to address some issues about control complexity and stability of
chilled water supply temperature when using the variable ow,
primary-only pumping systems.
Taylor [4] stated that using variable speed chillers and/or variable ow, primary-only pumping systems is a viable means to
eliminate signicant degradation in system performance at part
load operation while accommodating the low delta-T syndrome
of chilled water circuits. Hydeman et al. [5] developed a modied
DOE-2 chiller model which can be used to evaluate the performance of chillers with VSD or under varying condenser water ow
conditions. Such a modelling tool would form a good basis for
examining the potential benets of chiller systems using VSD. Hydeman and Zhou [6] presented a parametric analysis technique to

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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

optimize the control sequence of chilled water plants using VSD for
the chillers, condenser water pumps and cooling tower fans. Based
on simulation results of an example chiller plant, they demonstrated that the speed of the condenser pumps and tower fans
should be adjusted in response to the chiller load in order to
achieve optimized plant performance.
Gordon et al. [7] highlighted that the condenser water ow rate
could be a control variable in improving the energy performance of
chiller systems. They established an analytic semi-empirical chiller
model to study variations of chiller COP (coefcient of performance) at different condenser water ow rates. No analysis was
made on the system level involving the interaction between the
compressor power, pump power and tower fan power. The model
serves well for fault detection and diagnosis purposes, but is incapable of accounting the varying operating characteristics of cooling
towers. No control regime was generalized on how the condenser
water ow should be varied in response to various chiller load
and wet-bulb temperature conditions in order to achieve optimal
energy performance of the system.
Hartman is a pioneer promoting all-variable speed chiller plants
where all the chillers, condenser pumps and tower fans are driven
by VSD [8]. He explained criteria for designing such plants, selecting the equipment and operating the equipment in order to
achieve the highest overall plant performance at part load conditions. Based on his simulation analyses, the annual energy use of
all-variable speed chiller plants with optimized controls would
be on average 28% lower than the corresponding conventional constant speed plants with equipment of the same nominal efciency
at design conditions. He also developed the equal marginal performance principle (EMPP) for designing efcient air-conditioning
systems [9]. The EMPP involves understanding the power relationships between the system components and formulating the powerbased speed control algorithms to operate the variable speed
equipment.
All the past studies have brought individual contributions to
promoting VSD applications in chiller systems. Yet there is a lack
of simple but generic approach to controlling all-variable speed
chiller plants. More track records of using all-variable speed chiller
systems with advanced control are considered necessary, considering the use of variable speed technology will continue to grow to
sustain highly efcient chiller systems. The aim of this paper is
to investigate how load-based speed control should be applied to
all-variable speed chiller plants to enhance their environmental
and economic benets. This paper rst describes an all-variable
speed chiller plant and a conventional constant speed plant considered in the simulation study. Optimal regions of constant and variable speed chillers will be presented to illustrate how to
determine optimum chiller sequencing. Based on the chiller system models developed, the annual electricity and water consumption will be predicted for the two systems operating for the cooling
load prole of an ofce building. Operating cost differences between the two systems will be calculated and compared in an economic analysis. Discussion will be given on how the pumps and
tower fans should operate based on the simple load-speed relationship in order to achieve near optimal system control. After that,
some remarks will be made on using the EMPP and power-based
speed control for system optimization. The signicance of this
study is to provide more solid data which helps widen the use of
all-variable speed chiller systems for greener buildings.
2. Methods of study
2.1. Equipment and plant arrangement
Figs. 1 and 2 show two systems with the conventional and allvariable speed congurations considered in the simulation study.

CT 1

CT2

CT 3

Cooling towers (CT)

Heat rejection rate:
2480kW each

Chiller 1
(2130 kW)
Chiller 2
(2130 kW)
Condenser
water pumps

Chiller 3
(2130 kW)

Primary chilled
water pumps

Decoupling bypass
VSD

Air side system coils with

2-way control valves

VSD
Variable speed secondary
chilled water pumps

Fig. 1. Schematic of the conventional system with constant speed conguration.

Regarding the conventional system, each modelled component is

based on commonly used equipment types. Three identical constant speed centrifugal chillers were used, each of which had a full
load COP of 6.1 and an integrated part load value (IPLV) of 7.0. The
IPLV formula, as dened in the ARI standard 550/590 [10], is given
by Eq. (1) and used for the part load performance rating of a single
chiller. The weighting factors of 0.01, 0.42, 0.45 and 0.12 are based
on the weighted average of the most common building types and
climate conditions for 29 US cities, with and without airside economizers. Regarding the constant speed chillers studied, the COP is
6.1 at 100% full load, 7.1 at 75%, 7.4 at 50% and 5.5 at 25%.

IPLV 0:01A 0:42B 0:45C 0:12D

where A, COP at 100% full load with 29.4 C entering condenser

water (ECWT); B, COP at 75% full load with 23.9 C entering condenser water (ECWT); C, COP at 50% full load with 18.3 C entering
condenser water (ECWT); D = COP at 25% full load with 18.3 C
entering condenser water (ECWT).
Each of the chillers operated with 7 C leaving chilled water and
29.4 C entering condenser water for all operating conditions. The
ow rate per cooling capacity was designed at 0.043 l/s per kW for
chilled water and 0.053 l/s per kW for condenser water, which is
related to a temperature difference of 5.5 C for both the chilled
water and condenser water at peak load conditions. Constant
speed pumps were considered for the primary chilled water loop
and condenser water loop while variable speed pumps were used
for the secondary chilled water loop. The chilled water distribution
system contained a decoupling bypass pipe linking the primary
and secondary chilled water loops to balance the ow under part
load conditions.

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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

CT 1 VSD

CT 2 VSD

VSD

CT 3 VSD

Cooling towers (CT)

Heat rejection rate:
2480 kW each

Chiller 1 VSD
(2130 kW)

VSD

VSD
VSD
Condenser
water pumps

Chiller 2
(2130 kW)

VSD

Chiller 3
(2130 kW)

VSD

VSD
VSD
Primary chilled
water pumps

Low load bypass

Air side system coils with

2-way control valves

tion of chiller loads and wet-bulb temperatures, the chiller system

model would search for optimal speeds of the operating chillers,
pumps and tower fans in order to minimize the overall system
power. Instead of controlling directly the chilled water and condenser water temperatures, they were allowed to oat within their
boundary conditions to achieve the optimal speed control with
maximum energy performance. The possible change of the temperatures was identied from the simulation and will be presented in
the results and discussion section.
For both systems, the plant models decided the sequencing of
chillers based on any given hourly building cooling load. The chillers carried the equal percentage load and each of which operated
in parallel with one primary chilled water pump, one condenser
water pump, and one cooling tower. The equal percentage load
strategy is inevitable when chillers operate with the same temperature difference of chilled water and each of them carries their
nominal chilled water ow delivered by constant speed pumps. It
is possible to have equal or non-equal load fractioning between the
chillers operating with variable speed pumps producing varying
chilled water ows. Considering that variable speed chillers operate with maximum COP at part load regions instead of at full load,
it is desirable to apply the equal percentage load strategy in order
to ensure that each of the chillers (of the same size and performance) carried the modest load (lying within the optimal region)
as far as possible. It should be noted that no stand-by equipment
capacity is considered for the two systems and the total plant
capacity matches with the peak building cooling load. Table 1 summarizes other details of the two systems.
2.2. Cooling loads and climate
The cooling load prole of a reference ofce building was considered. Detailed descriptions of the building and its load prole

Fig. 2. Schematic of all-variable speed chiller system.

Three identical cross-ow cooling towers were used, each of

which catered for the heat rejection rate of each chiller at design
conditions and was equipped with a fan running at 100/50% of full
speed. Through the high/low fan speed control, the towers produced the leaving cooling water at 29.4 C required for heat rejection at the condensers for various combinations of load and wetbulb temperature conditions. The total chilled water pump head
required was 400 kPa, 160 kPa of this was allocated to the primary
pumps and the remainder to the secondary pumps. The two secondary pumps operated one by one to meet the changing chilled
water ow demand of the airside system coils. Each of the condenser water pumps was designed to operate at a head of
200 kPa while circulating the nominal ow rate to the condenser.
With regard to the all-variable speed system, the number and
design capacity of the components are quite similar to those of
the conventional system except that all the components are controlled by VSD and the primary-only chilled water distribution system was used. The variable speed chillers had a full load COP of 6.1,
the same as the constant speed chillers, but with a much higher
IPLV of 9.8 because of their superior part load performance. The
system pressure head of 400 kPa (same as the conventional system
ones) was applied to determine the head requirement of the variable speed chilled water pumps. The minimum speed for all the
pumps was set at 50% of full speed to ensure sufcient water ow
rate at the evaporator and condenser of each operating chiller. The
tower fan speed could be adjusted continuously from 10% to 100%
of full speed. The surplus chilled water would ow through the low
load bypass pipe only when the load which the lead chiller carried
called for less than 50% of the rated ow. For any given combina-

Table 1
Physical data of two chiller systems
System

Conventional

All-variable
speed

Total plant cooling capacity (kW)

For each chiller
Refrigerant type
Nominal cooling capacity per chiller (kW)
Nominal compressor power (kW)
COP at full load
Integrated part load value (IPLV)
Design chilled water supply/return
temperature (C)
Design chilled water ow rate (l/s)
Design condenser water entering/leaving
temp. (C)
Design condenser water ow rate (l/s)
For each cooling tower
Type
Heat rejection capacity (kW)
Design entering/leaving temperature (C)
Water ow rate (l/s)
Fan type

6390

6390

R134a
2130
350
6.1
7.0
7/12.5

R134a
2130
350
6.1
9.8
7/12.5

92.4
30/35.5

92.4
30/35.5

107.6

107.6

Cross-ow
2480
30/35.5
107.6
Axial, two
speed
84
100.8
30.4
0.2
0.53

Cross-ow
2480
30/35.5
107.6
Axial,
variable
speed
84
100.8
30.4
0.2
0.53

26
26.1

26
62.7

54.9

28.8

28.8

Air volume ow rate (m3/s)

Air mass ow rate (kg/s)
Fan motor power (kW)
Drift loss (% of nominal ow)
Design water evaporation rate (% of nominal
ow)
Design wet-bulb outdoor temperature (C)
Rated power of each primary chilled water
pump (kW)
Rated power of each secondary chilled water
pump (kW)
Rated power of each condenser water pump (kW)

F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

30

No. of operating hours

800

25

700
600

Building load profile

Average wet bulb temperature

500

15

400
300

10

200

100
0

20

0.1-.2 .2-.3 .3-.4 .4-.5 .5-.6 .6-.7 .7-.8 .8-.9

.9-1

9
ECWT (oC)

Chiller COP

900

Average wet bulb temperature at each

load bin (oC)

1724

18.3
23.9
29.4

7
6

Optimal region

5
4
3
0

0.2

evaluation are given elsewhere [11]. The building had a peak load
of 6389 kW with annual cooling hours of 2834 h (90.5% of the
buildings annual opening hours). The hourly cooling loads of the
building were modelled in the subtropical Hong Kong climate
using an example weather year. The annual cooling energy was
7,423,883 kWh. Fig. 3 shows the load-frequency distribution of
the building along with the average outdoor wet-bulb temperature
at each load bin. The hourly building cooling load data are expressed as ratios to the peak level of 6389 kW. It is undesirable
to have a single chiller system operating for the building load prole as the rst bar at the load bin of 0.10.2 in Fig. 3 illustrates, the
chiller needs to work at a part load ratio of 0.2 or below with very
low COP for 28% of the total cooling hours. Given this situation,
three identical chillers were considered for the two systems serving the building. It is possible to ensure that each of the three chillers carries a part load ratio (PLR) of at least 0.28 which is well
above its minimum allowable capacity step. The minimum PLR of
0.28 refers to a situation where one of the three chillers rated at
2130 kW operates for the lowest building load of 596 kW.
2.3. Optimal region of chiller
Given that chiller power dominates the system power, it is
worth determining how to stage chillers for their most efcient
operation. Running chillers at full load as far as possible is a conventional way to minimize system power, considering that most
existing chillers with constant speed compressors have maximum
COP at full load and that pumping energy per unit cooling capacity
is lowest at full load conditions. However, prolonging the full load
operation of chillers cannot achieve the least power consumption if
they have superior COP at part load instead of at full load. It should
be noted that in absence of storage devices, operating the chiller at
part load in order not to dissipate surplus cooling energy is convenient, although the COP could result in a lower level. To meet the
actual cooling load, it is essential to look for minimum power consumption of the whole plant rather than maximum chiller COP. A
more generic approach to operating chillers with maximum efciency is based on the optimal loading points or region at which
the maximum COP takes place for any given condenser water
entering/leaving temperature.
Figs. 4 and 5 show the part load performance curves of the constant speed and variable speed chillers together with their optimal
region at different entering condenser water temperatures (ECWT).
With regard to the constant speed chiller, the COP drops considerably at low part load ratios and the local maxima are situated in a
at region of the curve (PLR of 0.81) with a slight variation of 5%
in COP, regardless of the condenser water temperatures. For the
variable speed chiller, the COP increases considerably, taking into

0.6

0.8

Fig. 4. Part load performance curves for the constant speed centrifugal chiller.

15

Chiller COP

Fig. 3. Frequency distribution of hourly building load ratios with average wet-bulb
temperature at each load bin.

0.4

Chiller part load ratio

Building load ratio

10

ECWT ( o C)
18.3
23.9
29.4

5
Optimal region

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

Chiller part load ratio

Fig. 5. Part load performance curves for the variable speed centrifugal chiller.

account the condenser temperature relief under part load conditions. The maximum COP occurs at lower chiller loads when ECWT
drops, resulting in the optimal region leaning towards the low load
conditions. ECWT could be considered as a parameter other than
COP used to adjust the optimal chiller load region.
The schedules of chiller sequencing shown in Tables 2 and 3
were formulated for the two systems in order to maximize the
chiller performance. Regarding the conventional system, the traditional principle of chiller sequencing is still applicable as the optimal region of the chillers is quite close to the full load for all
condenser water entering temperatures. The least number of chillers operating is still used to meet the changing building cooling
load. While for the all-variable speed system, all the three chillers
would be staged starting from a building load ratio of 0.63, instead
of 0.67, in order to allow them to run as closely as possible to the
optimal region. The start-up frequencies of the three chillers in the
two systems are roughly the same.
3. Simulation of electricity and water use for the chiller system
The chilled water plant simulation was performed with the use
of component models for the chillers, pumps and cooling towers
developed under the TRNSYS 15 environment [12]. Fig. 6 shows a
ow diagram of the modelling the chiller under TRNSYS 15. Please
refer to Ref. [13] for details of the model and equations used. Input
variables of the model comprise the chiller load (Qcl), dry-bulb
temperature (Tadb), wet-bulb temperature (Tawb), chilled water
supply temperature (Tchws), chilled water mass ow rate (mw), condenser water ow rate (mcdw) and condenser water entering temperature (Tcdwe). Given these input variables, the model computes
over 30 operating variables, the power-related variables and chiller

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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

Variable speed: gcc

Table 2
Schedule of staging chillers for the conventional system
Building load
ratio (BLR)

0 < BLR 6 0.33

0.33 < BLR 6 0.67
0.67 < BLR 6 1

0:0291T cdwe  1:58PLR2 0:0485T cdwe 2:904PLR

No. of
total
cooling
hours

No. of
operating
chillers

Total
capacity of
operating
chillers

Chiller part load ratio

1171
1086
577

1
2
3

2130
4260
6390

0.28
0.5
0.67

Minimum

1
1
1

Table 3
Schedule of staging chillers for the all-variable speed system
Building load
ratio (BLR)

No. of
total
cooling
hours

No. of
operating
chillers

Total
capacity of
operating
chillers

Chiller part load ratio

Minimum

Maximum

0 < BLR 6 0.33

0.33 < BLR 6 0.63
0.63 < BLR 6 1

1171
969
694

1
2
3

2130
4260
6390

0.28
0.5
0.63

1
0.95
1

Data file of
operating conditions
Data reader

Constant
parameters

Input variables:
Qcl, Tadb, Tawb , Tchws, mw, mcdw, Tcdwe

0:0095T cdwe  0:0475

Maximum

Equations for
evaluating refrigerant
properties

The compressor and condenser have to satisfy the mass balance of

refrigerant and energy balance at the evaporator. The chiller model
was calibrated to imitate the part load COP curves shown in Figs. 4
and 5. These curves were constructed based on performance data
from a chiller catalogue with given ow and temperature conditions of the chilled water and condenser water. The model is capable of capturing the COP with deviation of 2.8% to 9.1% at most
under various operating conditions when the design and control
of chiller components are changed.
Regarding the conventional system, the power of the constant
speed pumps varied step by step, depending on the number of
chillers operating. While variable speed pumps were used, their
power was evaluated by using pump afnity laws with the computed ow rate or rotating speed. With regard to the cooling tower
model, the Ntu-effectiveness (Ntunumber of transfer units) approach was used [14], under which a change in the heat transfer
effectiveness of the tower at various combinations of airow and
water ow is taken into account. This approach enabled the heat
rejection airow required to be computed, based on the given
wet-bulb temperature and the condenser water entering temperature calculated by the condenser model. The fan power (Ect) was
evaluated by using polynomial approximations of fan characteristics under two speed control or under variable speed control, based
on the airow rate (Va) calculated. Equations for the fan power calculation are given in Eqs. (4) and (5). Ectr and Var represent the values of Ect and Va at the full speed condition.

Two speed : Ect 0:5Ectr Va =Var

Chiller model input file

for Va 6 0:5Var ;

Ect Ectr 1:5Va =Var  0:5 for 0:5V ar < Va

Evaporator

Compressor

Condenser

Variable speed : Ect Ectr Va =Var

Printer
Operating variables in
each operating condition

Control
algorithm of
cooling towers

Fig. 6. Flow diagram of modelling the chiller under TRNSYS 15.

COP, through solving over 36 algebraic equations in an iterative

process. The structure of the chiller model is based on the thermodynamic models used extensively to investigate the energy performance of chillers. Mechanistic relations between chiller
components were taken into account. The log mean temperature
difference (LMTD) method was used to model the heat transfer
characteristics of the evaporator and condenser under the full load
and part load conditions. Given an isentropic work input (Win) to
the compressor, a combined motor and transmission efciency
(gcc) curve was used to determine the actual chiller power (Ecc =
Win/gcc) at various part load conditions when the capacity control
was done either by modulating the inlet guide vanes at constant
speed or by regulating the rotating speed via VSD. gcc was determined using regression analysis with the performance data of Ecc
in various operating conditions. As Eqs. (2) and (3) illustrate, gcc
is expressed as a function of chiller part load ratio (PLR) and condenser water entering temperature (Tcdwe).

Constant speed: gcc

0:0275T cdwe 0:2708PLR2 0:025T cdwe 0:5612PLR
0:0123T cdwe  0:1059

4
5

The overall annual electricity consumption of the chiller plants is

the sum of all hourly chiller power, pump power and tower fan
power, with respect to the building cooling load prole and the
schedule of staging chillers.
The water consumption of a cooling tower is made up of three
parts of water loss: evaporation, drift and bleed-off. The cooling
tower model considered the overall mass and energy balance of
cooling water and outdoor air to simulate the states of the air leaving the tower and, in turn, to estimate the evaporation loss rate.
The drift rate and bleed-off rate were assumed to be 0.2% and
0.6%, respectively, of the cooling water circulation rate, with regard
to the use of traditional chlorination water treatment.

4. Results and discussion

4.1. Annual electricity and water consumption
The annual electricity and water consumption was estimated
for the two chiller systems, as summarized in Table 4. All the values are normalized by the total air-conditioned oor area (i.e.
42840 m2) of the building for easy comparison with other buildings of the same type, of similar use and located in a similar climate zone. For the variable speed chiller system, the savings of
energy use components in relation to the conventional case are
given.
Some important observations can be made about the simulation
results. Using the all-variable speed system could bring about savings in all the energy use components and water use. A 19.7% decrease in the annual plant electricity consumption is due mainly
to the electricity saving of the chilled water pumps, followed by

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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

Table 4
Annual plant electricity and water consumption per unit of air-conditioned oor area
of the building
System

Conventional
(1)

All-variable
speed (2)

Normalized annual electricity consumption (kWh/m2)

Chiller
28.2
25.7
Chilled water pump
5.8
3.0
Condenser water pump
3.4
1.3
Cooling tower fan
1.0
0.9
Total
38.5
30.9
Average chiller COP
6.1
6.7
507.2
426.7
Normalized annual water
2
consumption (L/m )

Savings from the

conventional case
(1)(2)
2.5
2.8
2.1
0.1
7.6

80.6

(9.0%)
(48.5%)
(61.8%)
(10.3%)
(19.7%)
(15.9%)

the condenser water pumps, chillers and tower fans. This suggests
that reducing the ow rate of chilled water and condenser water is
a viable means to decrease greatly the system power during part
load operation, though it may give a diminishing return on the
reduction of chiller power resulting from a moderate increase in
the COP. With regard to the variable speed system, there was little
difference in the chiller COP between the nominal and reduced
chilled water ow conditions. However, when the condenser water
ow rate decreased with the chiller load or the wet-bulb temperature, the extent to which the chiller COP can increase would diminish in various degrees because the reduced condenser water ow
tempered the condensing temperature relief to save the compressor power. Indeed, the average chiller COPthe annual cooling energy of 7,423,883 kWh over the annual chiller electricity
consumptionincreased moderately to 6.7 even when the variable
speed chillers with a high IPLV of 9.8 were used. Given the reduced
condenser water ow conditions, the water consumption of the
cooling towers could drop by 15.9% in the all-variable speed case
in relation to the conventional case.
4.2. Economic analysis
In order to judge the cost-effectiveness of the variable speed
chiller system, it is necessary to predict the capital cost investment
and how much operating cost this system can save. Local tariff
structures were considered to evaluate the operating costs associated with the annual electricity and water consumption of the chiller systems. The maximum demand tariff of one of the local power
companies was used to calculate the annual electricity consumption. This tariff involves monthly demand charges of HK$42.1/
kVA for the rst 400 kVA and HK$41.1/kVA for the next additional
kVA, and monthly energy charges of HK$1.023/kWh for the rst
200 units (i.e. kWh) supplied per month per kVA of maximum demand and of HK$0.962/kWh for each additional unit supplied.
Regarding the water charge tariff, the make-up water cost of
HK$4.58/m3 and the sewage charge of HK$1.2/m3 from bleed-off
were used, based on guidelines stated in the pilot scheme for the
wider use of fresh water in evaporative cooling towers for energy-efcient air-conditioning systems [15].
Assuming that the variable speed system does not incur any
additional recurrent costs (such as repair and maintenance costs),
its cost-effectiveness can be analysed by using a simple payback,
net present value, and the internal rate of return which is a measure of return in percentage to be expected on a capital investment.
The life cycle operating cost was also considered, which is the sum
of the discounted value of the annual electricity and water costs
over the lifespan of the system. A 15-year economic life was used
for the chillers with reference to the economic analysis for
mechanical equipment in ASHRAE 90.1 [16]. During this 15-year
lifespan, it was assumed that no major alternation of the chiller

Table 5
Operating costs comparison for the two chiller systems
System

Conventional
(1)

180
Capital cost (HK$/m2)
Annual operating cost (HK$/m2)
Electricity
46.4
Water
2.7
Total
49.1
Simple payback (yr)

Internal rate of return

(for 15 yr) (%)

Life cycle operating cost (HK$/m2)
Electricity
353.0
Water
20.2
Total
373.1
Net present value
553.1

All-variable
speed (2)

Savings from the

conventional case
(1)(2)

198

18

39.4
2.2
41.6
2.4 (=18/7.5)
41.5

299.8
16.7
316.5
514.5

7.0
0.5
7.5

53.2
3.5
56.7
38.6

system would take place. Based on the current bank loan interest
rate and the perception of the future monetary value, a discount
rate of 10% was used in the calculation of the life cycle operating
cost [17]. The 15-year economic life was considered in the calculation of the internal rate of return.
Table 5 gives the economic indicators of the two systems. All
the cost gures are presented as HK$ per unit of the total air-conditioned oor area in m2 of the building. For the two systems, the
annual electricity cost accounts for around 95% of the annual total
operating cost. Given this, the operating cost saving is virtually
proportional to the annual electricity saving. Considering that the
capital investment of the conventional chiller system is HK$180/
m2 (assuming HK$1200 per kW of plant cooling capacity an
indicative gure from informal consultation with local chiller suppliers), the simple payback could be 2.4 years based on the
assumption that the variable speed drives and the associated control system of the all-variable speed system could cause an additional cost by up to HK$18/m2 or 10% of the capital cost of the
conventional system. In this situation, the building owner who
purchases the variable speed chiller system instead of the conventional ones can enjoy a net savings of HK$38.6/m2 when operating
the chiller system throughout the 15-year lifespan. The internal
rate of return was identied to be 41.5% which is much higher than
the assumed discount rate of 10%. This suggests that the variable
speed system is a better-paying investment. It will be more economically attractive to adopt such an all-variable speed chiller
plant if there is a cost premium to balance the additional cost
resulting from the use of VSD and a demand side management programme which provides a rebate for electricity savings by use of
energy-efcient measures.
4.3. Load-based speed control for all-variable speed chiller system
All the equipment in a variable speed chiller system should be
provided with proper speed control in order to effectively operate
the system with minimum power consumption. Each chiller makes
use of its own microprocessor with proprietary control to adjust
the compressor speed in response to the changing chiller load
while controlling the chilled water supply temperature at its set
point. The minimization of energy use for the system, therefore, refers to optimizing the operation of chilled water pumps, condenser
water pumps and cooling tower fans for all ambient and chiller
load conditions. Given the variable primary ow conditions, it is
worth ascertaining how to control the speed of the chilled water
pumps which deliver the ow required to meet the chiller load
while allowing the chillers to run closely at their optimal region
in order to minimize the total power consumption. Based on the

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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

simulation analysis, the variable speed drive should regulate the

pump speed (RPMchp) as a function of chiller part load ratio (PLR)
based on Eq. (6). RPMchp,full is the full speed of the pump.

RPMchp

PLR RPMchp;full if PLR > 0:5

0:5RPMchp;full if PLR 6 0:5

This direct load-speed correlation in Eq. (6) is equally applicable for

the operation of the condenser water pumps to achieve system
optimization. Such a load dependent control scheme for pump
speed has been supported by another study on optimizing chiller
plant controls [6], with which the condenser water pump control
is given by: % CW pump speed  no. of pumps = 0.08  plant load
(tons) + 50.42. The actual form of the load-speed relationship will
be different if the chiller system has different designs with respect
to the number and size of chillers and pumps to meet the peak
building demand. It is envisaged that the simple load-speed relationship could facilitate the commissioning procedure for optimized
system performance and the implementation of automated fault
detection and diagnostics because it is executed by feed forward
control in response to the changing chiller load instead of the conventional feed backward control in maintaining the chilled water
and condenser water temperatures.
Compared to Hartmans power-based control that the speed of
pumps and tower fans is related to the power drawn by the operating chiller, the load-speed relationship reported here is even
straightforward and easy to be recognized for other similar chiller
applications. It is preferable to use the load-based speed control
than the power-based speed control because the chiller load is dictated purely by the building cooling load and is independent on the
interdependence of the power relationships between the chillers,
pumps and tower fans. Furthermore, using the load-based speed
control enables the ow rates of chilled water and condenser water
to vary linearly with the chiller load, given that speed is directly
proportional to ow rate according to the pump laws. In this situation, the delta-T or temperature difference of the chilled water
and condenser water can remain constant at their design conditions. This results in more stable temperature control which is
essential for maintaining the dehumidifying capacity of airside system coils and helps avoid the low delta-T syndrome which leads to
premature staging of chillers at light load conditions. Overall
applying load-based speed control to pumps with design deltaT is a viable means to optimize the trade-off between the compressor power and pump power.
To achieve absolute system optimization with minimum energy
consumption, the speed of cooling tower fans should be controlled
in response to not only the chiller load but also to the outdoor wet-

bulb temperature, given that the wet-bulb temperature is one of

the key variables inuencing the heat rejection effectiveness of
the towers. Yet it is possible to determine the optimum tower
fan speed based simply on the chiller load only to have near optimal control of the system. The data set shown in Fig. 7 refers to the
optimum fan speed at which the minimum total power consumption took place when the lead chiller operated for the building
cooling prole with various combinations of chiller loads (PLR of
0.140.95) and wet-bulb temperatures (Tawb of 722 C). Based
on the regression curve with the coefcient of determination of
(R2) of 0.95, the near-optimum percentage fan speed (RMPfan)
can be predicted by Eq. (7), where RMPctf,full is the full speed of
the fan.

RMPctf RMPctf;full 0:7039PLR 0:2512

A generic form for the direct fan speed control would be: RPMctf = c1
PLR + c2, where c1 and c2 are constants to be determined based on
the performance characteristics and power rating of cooling towers.
Such kind of simplied tower fan control has been given in a study
on a generic control algorithm for cooling towers [18]. Referring to
traditional cooling water temperature control, the approach (condenser water entering temperature minus ambient wet bulb) may
be xed irrespective of operating conditions to enhance chiller
tower control. Yet based on the graphical analysis shown in Fig. 8,
the optimal approach with minimum power consumption varied
between 3.6 and 4.9 C in response to the chiller load, but the approach-load relationship is very vague when the chiller operated
at above half load. This suggests that it is not feasible to use a cooling water temperature (with varying values at a given chiller load)
to control the tower fan speed in order to achieve minimum power
consumption.
Another chiller system simulation was carried out to identify
the likely implications of using load-based speed control on the
environmental performance of the variable speed system. It is
found that the control brought about no appreciable difference in
the annual water consumption, but only caused a slight increase
of 2.8% in the annual electricity consumption of the chillers and
tower fans. The load-based speed control for cooling tower fans, indeed, eliminates the need of using high quality temperature or relative humidity sensor to measure the wet-bulb temperature. This,
in turn, helps minimize the noisy control signal resulting from the
measurement errors, and at the same time, to provide more stable
fan speed control because the wet-bulb temperature tends to vary
often compared to the chiller load.
It is essential to equip variable speed chiller plants with proper
instruments to perform real-time measurement and verication of

5.0

Optimal approach (Tcdwe - Tawb) with

minimum power consumption (o C)

% full speed of fans at minimum power

consumption

100

80

60

40

20

Near-optimum % fan speed = 70.387 PLR + 25.119

2

R = 0.9509

0
0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

Chiller part load ratio

Fig. 7. Load-based speed control for cooling tower fans.

1.0

4.5

4.0

3.5

3.0
0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

Chiller part load ratio

Fig. 8. Relationship between optimal approach and chiller part load ratio.

1728

F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

the building cooling load and the chiller load in order to implement
load-based speed control for the pumps and tower fans. The monitoring of these loads is crucial for ascertaining whether the chillers
are staged according to their optimal region and for allocating the
system load evenly to the operating chillers. Under the variable
ow conditions, neither the ow rate nor temperature difference
of chilled water can serve to indicate the actual chiller load. The
load which each operating chiller carries should be computed
directly from the measured ow rate and temperatures of the
chilled water. Based on the chiller load calculated, the speeds of
the pumps and tower fans associated with the chillers operating
can be readily determined for optimized operation.
4.4. Remarks on usingequal marginal performance principle (EMPP) to
achieve system optimization
The results of this study indicate that the energy performance of
a chiller system can be improved considerably by using all-variable
speed congurations. To achieve such improvement, it is important
to minimize the aggregate power of all the system components for
all operating conditions. The load-based speed control has been
introduced as one of the means to achieve minimum power consumption of all-variable speed chiller plants. Hartman, on the other
hand, has demonstrated the EMPP as a theoretical approach to
understanding the power relationships between the components
for optimizing all-variable speed chiller plants [8,9]. One criterion
for applying EMPP is to express the system output (cooling capacity, Q) as a function of components power inputs in the form:
Q = f(Component 1 power, Component 2 power . . . Component n
power). When the mathematical expression of this formula is identied, the optimum system COP can be determined by equating all
marginal COPs of the power components, where marginal COP for
component x is given by o Q/oComponent x power.
Creating a cooling output expression for a multiple-chiller system is a complicated and even difcult process, which is not the
scope of this study. Yet some remarks are presented below on
using the EMPP to implement system optimization. There are a total of 12 power components with regard to a variable speed system
with three pairs of chillers, chilled water pumps, condenser water
pumps and cooling tower fans. Due to the sequencing of chillers,
each component power varies in discrete steps at certain loading
points over the entire range of building cooling loads. This discrete
power variation can cause difculty in evaluating the marginal
COPs for each power component. To counter this, it may be necessary to create a set of system output expressions, each of which
caters for a certain building cooling load range handled by a given
number of operating chillers. The time and effort to create the system output expressions and to determine the marginal COPs would
be highly intensied if the chiller system is on a large scale with
many sequencing (or staging) patterns of the power components.
While there is a generic form for expressing the system output,
the coefcients and mathematical formula for representing each
power component are specic, given that each chiller system
should have its own design and power requirements. At present
no analytic tool has been developed for using EMPP to determine
the mathematical expression of cooling outputs for any given system design with respect to the number and size of chillers. Under
this circumstance, the power relationships in mathematical form
may be identied by using curve tting techniques in cases where
an ample set of power-related operating data is collected for a system with various cooling outputs. This suggests that the EMPP is
viable for use after the system is working in the post-operation
stage. It is more desirable, however, to apply the EMPP in the system design stage to facilitate optimum equipment selection and
power-based control development. It remains to be seen how the
evaluation of system design alternatives with the use of EMPP be-

comes a more simple and straightforward process. Compared to

the EMPP, the load-based speed control reported in this study is
generic and easy to be implemented for any chiller system with
typical design as it considers only the relationship between the
chiller load ratio and fractional speed of the equipment for optimum operation.
Based on the system output expression, the EMPP is applicable
for any system where each component has varying power characteristics in response to changes in the cooling output only. This
means that for a given system output, there is no other factor varying the power components except their interaction with each
other. Yet it is found from the simulation results that the cooling
tower fan power could change in response to various wet-bulb
temperatures while the system load and power components of
the chillers and pumps remain unchanged. The dependence of
the tower fan power with the wet-bulb temperature may call for
a set of system output expressions, each of which deals with a specic wet-bulb temperature. This may complicate the evaluation of
marginal COP for each power component and the power-based
speed control requirements. Another criterion for applying EMPP
is that each system component has to be sized and optimized in
its operation using identical methodologies. This means that all
the components should have identical performance at all operating
conditions and when running in parallel, they need to operate at
the identical fractional speed to achieve system optimization. The
design and control of chiller systems under the EMPP philosophy
are contrary to what have been implemented to conventional constant speed chiller plants which are preferable to be designed with
unequally sized chillers operating primarily with an uneven load
sharing strategy in order to prolong their full load operation for
plant optimization.
This study has not been dealt with some universal rules that
govern the optimal design of all-variable speed chiller plants with
respect to the number and capacity of chillers, the associated
pumps and cooling towers. The system output formula used with
EMPP may form a good basis for evaluating optimal design solutions as the marginal (or maximum) system performance can be
determined numerically with a given equation representing power
relationships between all the system components. It is hoped that
an explicit methodology will be launched by EMPP proposers or
developers to facilitate the evaluation of an output equation for a
given system conguration and to examine the equations accuracy. Designing a chiller plant with EMPP may help ascertain if certain oversizing of some of the system components with an
additional investment cost still gives an attractive payback while
prolonging their operation in the optimal region with maximum
COP.

5. Conclusions
This study examines how all-variable speed chiller systems
with load-based speed control yield economic benets and superior environmental performance with reduced electricity and
water consumption relative to the conventional constant speed
systems. Given the superior performance of variable speed devices
at part load operation, the basic principles of designing an all-variable speed chiller plant are using fewer and equally sized chillers
and considering a single-loop chilled water circuit with variable
ow. The variable speed chillers should be staged based on their
optimal region with maximum COP. With regard to an all-variable
speed chiller system operating for the cooling load prole of an
ofce building, the annual electricity consumption could decrease
the annual total electricity use by 19.7% and annual water use by
15.9% relative to the corresponding constant speed plant. Loadbased speed control is introduced as a simple and direct means

F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Applied Thermal Engineering 29 (2009) 17211729

to achieve optimal operation of all the variable speed equipment

while complying intrinsically with temperature requirements of
chilled water and condenser water. Under this control, the speed
of the chilled water pumps, condenser water pumps and tower
fans is regulated simply based on the chiller part load ratio. This
makes the optimization technology more easy and generic and
eliminates the need to identify power relationships between the
system components as required by EMPP.
Acknowledgement
The work described in this paper was supported by a grant from
the central research grant of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Project A/C Code: G-U272.
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