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Re: The chilling truth about cold horsepower
- To: Aquatic-Plants at actwin_com
- Subject: Re: The chilling truth about cold horsepower
- From: stevecj at mail_utexas.edu
- Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2003 10:41:02 -0500
- In-reply-to: <200306101056.h5AAu8Gr019632@otter.actwin.com>
- References: <200306101056.h5AAu8Gr019632@otter.actwin.com>
- User-agent: Internet Messaging Program (IMP) 3.2.2-cvs
Hi all,
Been lurking for a while, and thought I might try my hand at posting.
Scott H said:
>For example a 610 watt air conditioner is rated for 6000
>BTU/hr cooling capacity. 610 watts=2077 BTU/hr yields 6000
>BTU/hr cooling capacity. Does this not seem odd?
>There is something I am obviously missing here, but I'll be
>darned if I can figure it out, so far. I'm checking this
>further. I'll let you know what I find out.
There is another term you might want to consider called the "Coefficient of
Performance" (or COP). COP is used as a measure of efficiency of a
refrigeration system. It is defined as the cooling ability of the system over
the power input to the system. Because refrigerators, chillers, and air
conditioners only move heat from one location to another it is possible to move
an amount of thermal energy that is greater than the amount of work the pump or
motor puts into the system. It turns out that for air conditioners, typical
values for the COP are somewhere around 2-3 or so (as memory serves).
So, in your example above, the COP of the system would be (6000 BTU cooling)/
(2077 BTU power input) = 2.89. As I recall, a COP in this range is not
atypical. Hope this helps.
Steve