03.12.2008 First working day

THE CONGRESS OPENING

The international congress of heating, refrigerating and air-conditioning issues, was held for the 39th time, in the period from 3 – 5 December 2008 in Belgrade, organized by the Serbian HVAC&R Society (KGH). Every year this congress gathers researchers, scientists and professionals, and it is traditionally supported and endorsed by REHVA and ASHRAE. The congress is traditionally accompanied with a large exhibition, which has grown into an international fair dedicated to professionals from this scientific and engineering field. This year, there were 180 exhibitors from all over the world. 640 registered participants attended the congress, and the authors with total 64 papers came from England, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Austria, Russia, Greece, Romania, Belgium, Poland, Turkey, Egypt, the USA and all the republics of the former Yugoslavia. During the three congress days, about 2000 researchers, professionals, designers, investors, traders and representatives of equipment manufacturers from all over the world visited the exhibition, which was also held in the Belgrade’s SAVA congress centre.

The congress marked the celebration of the centenary of the first international refrigeration congress and foundation of the International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR), an intergovernmental institution for transfer of refrigeration science and technology. The year of 2008 was marked as the Refrigeration Year worldwide and the final celebration took place at this congress. This final celebration was also an occasion to recall a remarkable contribution of the Kingdom of Serbia to the foundation of the Institute. Along with France and the Netherlands, the Kingdom of Serbia was among the very first countries in the world that formed the refrigeration committee within the national government, since, at that time, the Serbia was an important exporter of food, especially meat.

Professor Todorović, in the capacity of the Chairman of the Congress Organizing Committee and the President of the Serbian HVAC&R Society, greeted the congress participants and guests and opened the congress. Mr. Slobodan Pejković, the director of “Filter Frigo”, the general patron of the congress, also gave the welcome speech. The first guest who addressed the participants was the director of the International Institute of Refrigeration from Paris, which celebrated 100 years of its successful activities in 2008. The Belgrade congress was dedicated to this institution and, therefore, Mr. Didier Coulomb, Director, talked about the Institute and Serbia’s contribution to its foundation in 1908. He emphasized the uninterrupted fruitful cooperation between Serbia and the Institute, mentioned the outstanding individuals - Mr. Stanojević, the first Serbian representative who represented the Kingdom of Serbia at the first congress 100 years ago, then Mr. J. Simončić who was a representative of the Institute for many years and later became it’s honorary member, professor Todorović, who was the Vice-President of the IIR Executive Committee in two terms, and the present Vice-Presidents of the IIR Commissions, Dr. Marija Todorović and Mr. Zoran Stajić. Then, Mr. Coulomb gave floor to the French Consul for scientific cooperation in Belgrade, who talked about the scientific and cultural cooperation between France and Serbia. After him Mr. William Harrison, ASHRAE President, paid compliments to the long-lasting cooperation of the Serbian, REHVA’s and American Societies and gave praises to the Belgrade congress, which is endorsed by ASHRAE every year. He was followed by the President of the Russian HVAC&R Association, Dr. Yuri Tabunshikov, who greeted colleagues from Serbia and announced that the AVOK prize for 2008 would be awarded to Professor Todorović for his initiative and support for the foundation of AVOK and his merits for the Russian Engineering School, laying emphasis on the success of this international congress, the opening of which he took part in. The Vice-President of the Russian association AVOK Mrs. Brodach presented to Professor Todorović a gold medal named by the late Russian scientist professor Bogoslavski, as a sign of recognition and gratitude. Visibly touched, Professor Todorović expressed his gratitude, without concealing that he was pleased and honoured.

INTRODUCTORY PRESENTATIONS

The congress opening was followed by the introductory presentations. The first speaker was Mr. Harrison, ASHRAE President, with the topic “Maintain to Sustain, Delivering ASHRAE’s Sustainability Promise, which was his message to the engineering community when taking ASHRAE presidency in June 2008. It was his appeal to all the members of this scientific and engineering community for support and dedication in their efforts to achieve sustainability and thus provide efficient operation of buildings in order to save energy. The second speaker was a Dr. Mesarović, famous energy engineer from “Energoprojekt” a large Belgrade company, whose presentation was focused on global warming as a consequence of energy consumption and possible adaptation of people to climate change. Dr. Predrag Hrnjak, a graduate of the Belgrade Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and the present director of the Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Centre, University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign, USA, talked about carbon dioxide as an increasingly refrigerant in the form of transcritical CO2, especially for heat pumps used for water heating, commercial cooling systems and air-conditioning in transport. Mrs. Susan Roaf, Professor of Sustainable Architecture from Heriot Watt University, UK, presented her paper on adaptation to three-degree climate change. She discussed the application of so called “cold” materials in construction, balance between natural and “constructional “ environment, and pointed out at inadequately built urban environments. Two representatives of the Russian Architectural Institute were professor Marriane Brodach and Professor Yuri Tabunshikov. Mrs. Brodach talked about characteristics of air-conditioning systems in high rise multi-purpose buildings Moscow and analyzed the shape of the building which has to be in harmony with the outdoor environment. She talked about the application of air-conditioning, natural ventilation and hybrid systems, natural lighting, elements that make a building “intelligent” as well as the use of the renewables in such extremely high structures. Mr. Yuri Tabunchikov also talked about high-rise buildings, their optimal design and construction as well as optimal control for the purpose of optimization of thermal and physical characteristics of buildings and performance during their life cycle. Mr. Renato Lazzarin, Professor of the University of Padova, who is the President of the Commission for Heat Pumps of the International Institute, presented the paper (Marco Noro - coauthor) analyzing energy saving by free cooling in different European climates aimed at cooling load reduction and decrease of the chiller cooling capacity for a given building load.

PROGRAMME BY THEMATIC FIELDS

Water Chillers and Heat Pumps

The other part of the first day’s programme was conducted in two sections. In the first one, dealing with water chillers and heat pumps, Mr. Per Lunaquist from Stockholm, the President of E2 Commission (Heat Pumps and Heat Recovery) of the International Institute of Refrigeration presented his paper. He talked about advances in heat pump technology and market development, mentioning that the current efforts made in the heat pump development are aimed at elimination of peak electric heating. The development comprises more efficient control, variable capacity, better utilization of bore holes, use of natural refrigerants and charge minimization through new types of heat exchangers. This section included presentations on installations with heat pump systems made in Serbia and former Yugoslavia during the first half of the 1980’s which are still in operation, heat pump classification, energy efficiency labelling for such equipment, energy saving by using chillers with oil-free turbo-compressors. The same author, Mr. Slobodan Pejković, talked about the use of gas engine-driven refrigeration compressor. There were presentations on heat pumps in Belgrade coastal area, feasibility of application of direct-fired chillers and heat pumps in HVAC systems. Professor Pavković from Croatia talked about feasibility. The author from RHOSS SPA, Italy, presented the problems of the application of polyvalent ground source heat pumps.

Refrigeration and Refrigerants

The last section of the first day was dedicated to refrigerants. Professor Ciconkov from the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia presented a survey of alternative solutions for the refrigerant R22. Dr. Hrnjak from the USA and his co-author Ping Zang talked about airside performance of three heat exchangers in dry, wet and periodic frosting conditions. Mr. Pachai from “Johnson Controls”, Denmark, presented his paper on trends in industrial refrigeration using CO2. The professors from the Belgrade Faculty of Agriculture discussed their research results relating to the freezing effect on seedless grape quality and water activity AW value in the cooling process.