Energy Star® requirements, government regulations, and competition continues to drive the geothermal industry to provide higher efficiency levels and greater equipment reliability. Overall, this is good for the customer and the environment. These challenges, however, are difficult to meet in some parts of North America, where indoor air quality and/or airborne chemicals cause premature indoor air coil failure (both convention air conditioners/heat pumps and geothermal systems). The failure is normally traced back to formicary corrosion, which is a type of corrosion that occurs as airborne chemicals mix with the condensation on the coil to form certain acids that aggressively attack copper tubing.
Beginning this fall, Enertech products (brand names GeoComfort®, Hydron Module®, and TETCO®) will ship with a standard all-aluminum, micro channel air coil. This new technology provides a solution that can meet the efficiency and reliability requirements mentioned above. Compared to traditional copper tube/aluminum fin coil technology, the micro channel heat exchanger (MCHX) coil offers the following benefits:
- Single material construction (all aluminum vs. copper/aluminum), eliminating the corrosion potential caused by dissimilar metals
- Improved heat transfer and thermal performance, resulting in increased unit efficiencies and lower operating costs
- Substantial refrigerant charge reduction, which is better for the environment
- 40% less material than a standard tube-and-fin copper/aluminum coil, which saves on unit weight and is also fully recyclable
- Enhanced structural robustness (less chance of damaging a fin simply by changing the unit’s filter)
When looking at the design of the micro-channel coil, the advantage over current tube-and-fin coils becomes very apparent. Where standard coils use large tubes to carry refrigerant through the fin-pack, the micro-channel coil utilizes hundreds of smaller channels arrayed within the coil to do the same job. However, because the circuitry is more evenly distributed, the refrigerant flows more naturally and the channels don’t restrict airflow. Not only does the new micro-channel air coil eliminate the potential for formicary corrosion, it delivers a wealth of other features and benefits as well. Enertech’s dedicated design and development staff has matched this exciting technology to the already innovative design of the GeoComfort Compass®, Hydron Module Revolution®, and TETCO ES4 Series product lines to create a truly next-generation product.
With the addition of Copeland’s next generation of two-stage UltraTech® compressor, all models have a dramatic increase in efficiencies. Additionally, all models meet the stringent ENERGY STAR Tier 3 ratings which go into effect January 1, 2012. Performance testing shows an average 5% COP and 15% EER improvement!
As Enertech is the first HVAC company to harness the micro-channel coil as both a condenser and evaporator, there have been a number of questions on how it performs with condensate run off. This video shows a four ton unit operating in high-stage cooling.
