Optimize your

facilitys energy
utilization with free heat

YORK MODEL YK
HEAT-RECOVERY
CHILLER

Reduce energy consumption

with sustainable technology
Take a step forward to reducing your
facilitys environmental footprint
Identifying technologies that can reduce the environmental
impact of your building at a reasonable cost is one of the
biggest challenges facing commercial, institutional, and
industrial facilities today.
As a major user of energy, heating and cooling systems hold
a key to resolving this challenge. Thats why Johnson Controls
offers a solution that addresses todays pressing environmental
and energy issuesthe YORK heat-recovery chiller.
Substantial heat energy is available
Your chillers not only remove heat from your buildings
conditioned space, the compressors add up to 25% more
thermal energy that must also be removed. This heat is
rejected by the cooling towers, which emit a tremendous
amount of heat energy into the atmosphere. In fact, ASHRAE
Standard 90.1 6.5.6.2 estimates that a facility with a yearround cooling load will reject a minimum of 6,000 MBH
(1,800 kW) into the ambient air.
To take advantage of that vast amount of free heat energy,
Johnson Controls offers heat-recovery technology on the
YORK Model YK centrifugal chillers ranging from 250 to 2,800
tons of refrigeration (9009,800 kW), which can provide from
1,200 to 40,000 MBH (40011,700 kW) heating capacity.

The double-bundle condenser of a heat-recovery chiller

contains the heating condenser and the tower condenser,
as shown in Figure 1. The warm refrigerant gas from the
compressor flows over both tube bundles.
The flow of heat in the double-bundle condenser is controlled
by a cooling-tower bypass valve (see Figure 2 on page 4).
The valve receives signals from a temperature sensor in
the heating circuit.
When heating is required, the tower-bypass valve directs the
water in the tower-condenser circuit to bypass the cooling
tower. Because the circuit cannot exhaust its heat, it gets
warmer and warmer, until it is the same temperature as the
refrigerant leaving the compressor, at which point it can no
longer absorb any more heat, effectively becoming inactive.
The refrigerant heat now passes into the water flowing
through the heating condenser, which carries the heat to the
heating load or to a booster boiler.
When less heat is required, the tower-bypass valve begins
to open, which causes more of the condenser heat to flow
into the tower-condenser circuit, and less heat flows into the
heating circuit.

Compressor

Heating condenser

Heat-recovery Chiller Specification

Cooling Capacity Range

2502,800 Tons (9009,800 kW)

Heating Capacity Range

1,20040,000 MBH (40011,700 kW)

Max. Hot Water Temperature

Refrigerant

Evaporated
refrigerant gas

Tower
condenser

110F (43C)

Evaporator

R-134a

Understanding heat-recovery chiller technology

A YORK Model YK heat-recovery chiller puts your facilitys
heat byproduct to work. Consequently, it saves energy by
decreasing the load on, and the fuel consumption of, your
facilitys boilers.
In a typical multiple-chiller plant employing heat recovery,
one chiller will be designed for heat recovery. It will usually
be the first chiller activated when cooling is required.

Condensed
refrigerant liquid

Expansion orifice

Figure 1: Refrigerant flow in a heat-recovery chiller.

Heat-recovery benefits
Facility Types

Heat-Recovery Uses

Facility Types

Heat-Recovery Uses

Hospitals/Medical Centers

The recovered heat can be

used to control humidity
in sensitive sites, like
laboratories and hospital
operating rooms.

Manufacturing

Manufacturing facilities can

take advantage of process
heat supplied by a heatrecovery chiller for their
process operations.

Hotels/Resorts

The recovered heat can be

used to reheat the air in
a hotel in a cooler climate.
Hotels can also utilize the
waste heat to preheat
domestic hot water for
pools, hot tubs, showers,
and laundry.

Educational

Education facilities
dormitories, athletic
complexes, and food
servicescan utilize heat
recovery to preheat
domestic hot-water
needs for laundry, showers,
cooking, and dishwashing.

Numerous applications
Practically any chiller plant that has simultaneous heating and
cooling needs, can utilize a heat-recovery chiller. Common
applications include hospitals and medical centers, hotels and
resorts, manufacturing facilities, and educational facilities.
Assured equipment selection
The expertise of Johnson Controls in understanding your
building environment, combined with YORK chiller-applications
experience, provides the best assurance of a proper heatrecovery chiller selection. To produce the greatest energy
savings, we analyze the chilled-water plant to take full advantage
of your load profiles. The result is a solution that fits your
budget while reducing your facility's energy-use profile.
Energy use and cost savings
A YORK heat-recovery chiller uses less total energy than
separate cooling and heating equipment by taking advantage
of free condenser heat that would otherwise be lost through
the cooling towers. In effect, a heat-recovery chiller lets
you do double-dutycooling and heating with the
same piece of equipment. This is more economically and
environmentally friendly than burning fossil fuels or using
electric-resistance heaters.
Environmentally friendly refrigerant
YORK heat-recovery chillers utilize HFC-134a refrigerant,
which has zero ozone-depletion potential and no phase-out

date. HFC-134a also has favorable thermodynamic properties

and specific volumes that are ideal for heat-recovery duty.
High heating COPs
The coefficient of performance (COP) of a heat-recovery
chiller in heating mode is outstanding. For example, with
chilled-water temperatures of 5444F (127C)
and tower water of 8595F (2935C), the cooling COP
could be 6.3. With hot water from 95105F (3541C),
the combined cooling and heating COP could be 11.4.
Low sound levels
Patented YORK OptiSound control technology is standard
on YORK heat-recovery chillers. This technology handles
the sound generated by chillers operating with highhead pressures and reduced loads, which are commonly
encountered in the heat-recovery operation. With the
OptiSound control, part-load sound levels do not exceed
full-load sound levels.
Complies with ASHRAE 90.1
ASHRAE 90.1, 6.3.6.2Heat Recovery for Service Water
Heating covers the efficient use of heat-recovery technology
in buildings. Application of a YORK heat-recovery chiller will
meet and exceed these exacting requirements to ensure
youre getting maximum energy savings.

Case study:
Global medical manufacturer
140F
(60C)

Heat
Exchanger

115F
(46C)

TC

Boiler
BWP
130F
(54C)

105F
(41C)

Cooling Tower

TE

Heating Condenser
95F
(35C)

105F
(41C)

TCV

Tower
Bypass valve

Tower Condenser

HWP

Heating Load

105F
(41C)

Compressor

CWP

TXV

Motor

Hot
Gas

42F
(6C)

Evaporator

52F
(11C)
ChWP

Figure 2: Heat-recovery chiller integrated with boiler loop.

Fully utilizing recovered heat

A medical manufacturing facility with simultaneous cooling
and heating requirements demonstrates the substantial energy
savings available with a YORK heat-recovery chiller.
In the configuration shown in Figure 2, heat that would otherwise
be lost is recovered in the heating condenser, to produce
105F (41C) water. In the winter, as the water flows through
the heat exchanger, the booster boiler adds enough heat
to raise its temperature to 130F (54C). The hot water is
distributed through the building to meet the comfort-heating
needs of the facility. During the summer, the boiler is not
required. The buildings heating needs can be satisfied

Printed on recycled paper.

PUBL-6317 (510)
2010 Johnson Controls, Inc. P.O. Box 423, Milwaukee, WI 53201 Printed in USA
www.johnsoncontrols.com

Cooling Load

using 105F (41C) water from the chiller, enabling energy-cost

reductions year-round.
In this case, the chiller is running in heat-recovery mode
year-round. When operating in heat-recovery mode (cooling
and heating simultaneously), the cooling capacity is 405 tons
(1,424 kW). The combined cooling and heating COP value
is 10.2. If the chiller would operate in cooling-only mode,
it would have a capacity of 425 tons (1,491 kW) with a 5.7 COP.
For more information on YORK Model YK heat-recovery
chillers, contact your nearest Johnson Controls office.
Or visit us on the Internet at www.johnsoncontrols.com.