AT-01-07-5 -- Ceiling Radiant Cooling Panels as a Viable Distributed Parallel Sensible Cooling Technology Integrated with Dedicated Outdoor Air Systems ✓ Most Recent

Emphasis is placed upon the integration of ceiling radiant panel cooling technology with other building mechanical systems in this paper. Applicable radiative and convective heat transfer equations are applied to illustrate the rates of heat removal that are representative of this technology. Also presented are the fundamental heat transfer equations that govern the radiant cooling panel mean temperature as a function of geometry, materials, flow rates, coolant temperature, and space temperatures. These fundamentals are then illustrated by a simple example where the radiant panels are integrated with a dedicated outdoor air system capable of maintaining the space dew-point temperatures. In this context, the radiant panels have no dehumidification duty, and condensation will not form on the surfaces. The illustration covers each of the iterative steps required to select the ceiling radiant cooling panels and a simplistic analysis of the resulting economic benefits. The paper wraps up with a detailed discussion of the functional integration of three hydronic systems: the dedicated outdoor air system cooling coil, the radiant panel network, and fire suppression network. The paper concludes that technical and economic barriers do not currently exist to inhibit the widespread application of ceiling radiant cooling panels with dedicated outdoor air systems. The dedicated outdoor air systems must be designed to control 100% of the space latent loads and, hence, the space dew-point temperatures.

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