June 21, 2006: ARTI Seeks Bids for Heat Exchanger Research Project
ARLINGTON, Va. - The Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Technology Institute (ARTI) is seeking bids for a new research project to identify and evaluate novel materials to improve the energy efficiency of heat exchangers.
According to ARTI, while the HVACR industry has historically utilized fairly traditional designs employing primarily fin-and-tube or plate heat exchangers, recent advances in material science have yielded potential new concepts in heat exchanger design with novel materials of construction that can increase heat transfer and/or reduce size and potentially cost. These materials include metal or carbon foams, lattice structures, as well as new components utilizing polymeric materials. Though some of these materials have been used for heat exchangers in other industries, there has been little investigation of their use in conventional HVACR systems.