As energy costs rise and fossil fuels deplete, causing shortage of power resources, we believe it is upon each one of us to make contributions to find suitable solutions to meet our requirements. McDonald’s uses a lot of power across restaurant operations and also generates a lot of heat through various appliances in use. For appliances and systems such as refrigerators and air conditioners to work efficiently, the heat generated by their operation must be disposed off. In most cases it is simply discharged from the systems condenser into the environment. Recovering a part of this wasted heat and using it to replace fuel makes smart business sense.
By deploying a unique super heat recovery system, McDonald’s has tried to capture heat generated from use of equipment and channel it for use across various applications such as heating water. On a trial basis, some restaurants have also been fitted with energy efficient Green Air Conditioning Systems, based on three different patented technologies developed at the Heat Pump Laboratory at IIT Bombay. The technologies enable capturing of potential waste heat to generate hot water for sanitation and potable chilled water for soft drinks and help condense refrigerant at lower temperatures compared to air and tower water cooled air conditioners.
The new air conditioning systems have helped reduce power consumption by 25% as compared to a conventional air-cooled water chiller. The system has simultaneously eliminated the gas fired water heaters and electrically operated imported potable water pre-chillers.
