FINAS HQ: Chilled Water Plant Control to 0.7 kW/RT

Cobler delivered the building management system (BMS) controls for the chilled water plant at the FINAS headquarters. The plant runs at 0.7 kW/RT and holds that figure across its operating range.

The site

FINAS, the National Film Development Corporation Malaysia, oversees the country's film and multimedia industry from a headquarters with studios, post-production suites and offices. The building has to stay cool and stable through long production hours. Its cooling comes from a central chilled water plant, and Cobler delivered the BMS controls for that plant.

The measure that matters: kW/RT

A chilled water plant is judged by its kW/RT: the electrical power it uses for every refrigeration ton (RT) of cooling it delivers. This is the plant's running efficiency. On a government facility that operates every day, it affects the bill every hour. Most plants run at around 0.85 to 1.0 kW/RT. This plant runs at 0.7.

One efficient chiller is not enough to reach 0.7. The figure is the combined result of the chillers, the pumps moving chilled water and condenser water, and the cooling tower fans. All of them must work to the building's real cooling load rather than at full output. The load swings through the day between full studios and quiet offices, so holding the figure is a control problem. That is the job of the BMS.

What we did

Cobler designed and delivered the building automation and BMS for the plant, which runs the chillers, pumps and cooling towers as one system.

• Chillers are staged to the building's real-time cooling demand. Each one stays in its efficient range instead of the plant running more capacity than it needs.
• Pump and cooling tower output follows the load. The energy used to move water and reject heat rises and falls with demand, while the plant keeps a healthy delta-T (the difference between supply and return water temperature).
• CobiNeural runs over the plant and tracks the kW/RT KPI (key performance indicator) live. Operators see plant efficiency as it happens instead of working it out from a bill.

What changed

The plant holds 0.7 kW/RT across its operating range, not only at a single design point. For a public facility that runs every day, this permanently reduces the cost of keeping the building cool. The plant's efficiency is also visible and controlled rather than assumed.

See how the same approach works on other plants in our case studies, or talk to us about chilled water plant control for your facility.