Ability Matrix fan-coil project wins green-building award
An air-conditioning system based on Ability Matrix EC-DC 4-pipe horizontal fan-coil units has contributed to the refurbishment of TPK House in Wellington, New Zealand, gaining the New Zealand Green Building Council 5 Green Stars Award. This award recognises the inherent energy efficiency of these units and also took account of the special demand-dependent fresh-air control and the innovative way this is managed by the integrated fan-coil strategy written and applied by Ability.
About 175 FCUs were supplied and co-ordinated on Ability’s behalf by its New Zealand agent Clima Solutions.
TPK House is the listed headquarters of the New Zealand Ministry of Maori Development.
Operating at a noise-level specification of NR37, all the units have self-balancing fans, Delta BACnet DAC controls and Belimo 4-pipe PICC valves, which are all overseen by a specially configured controls strategy and software-based engineering tool. This tool is installed in a portable computer and communicates with the FCUs using Bluetooth technology via a Bluetooth receiver plugged into any FCU in the installation. Installers, commissioning teams and end users can communicate with all FCUs in the building without recourse to the BMS.
The Matrix EC-DC fan-coil system provides infinite speed control of each fan in a unit, enabling the air volume of each duct run to be balanced through fan speed alone; there is no need for volume control dampers in ductwork.
As a safety feature, the Matrix controller monitors the air temperature off the coil and over-rides fan-speed control if the temperature is outside user-definable settings until the air-off temperature is back into line.
