ARTICLE IN PRESS

Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746

www.elsevier.com/locate/buildenv

Strategy for designing more energy efficient chiller plants serving

air-conditioned buildings
F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan
Department of Building Services Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China
Received 27 July 2005; received in revised form 22 August 2006; accepted 22 September 2006

Abstract

In cities located in the subtropical regions, air-cooled chillers are commonly used to cool commercial buildings almost year-round,
which accounts for considerable electricity consumption in the long term. This paper explains how a chiller plant should be designed to
enable the chillers to operate frequently with maximum performance. Four design options with respect to the number and size of chillers
were studied for a chiller plant satisfying the year-round cooling demand of a hotel. For each design option, the annual electricity
consumption of chillers and pumps was assessed using a sophisticated chiller model. The assessment showed that an electricity saving of
10.1% can be achieved by installing a chiller plant with six chillers of three different sizes instead of four equally sized chillers. The results
of this paper will give engineers and researchers a better idea about how to select chillers of different sizes and how chiller part load
performance curves can be used to evaluate improvements in the energy performance of a chiller plant with alternative designs.
r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Air-cooled chillers; Coefficient of performance; Chiller staging; Electricity consumption

1. Introduction different degrees of building cooling load. The multiple

In cities located in the subtropical regions, air-cooled
chillers are commonly used to provide cooling energy in
commercial buildings almost year-round. This accounts for
considerable electricity consumption in the long term and
one of the major sources for the peak electricity demand
[1–7]. It is worth investigating how the chillers can
operate at maximum efficiency as much as possible in
order to reduce the future electricity demand for the
building sector.
The coefficient of performance (COP) is generally used
to describe the operating efficiency of a chiller. It is defined
as the cooling capacity in kW over chiller power in kW. A
higher value of COP means higher chiller efficiency. For
small to medium-scale buildings requiring a cooling
capacity of 1050–7032 kW, between four and eight air-
cooled chillers with a cooling capacity of 350–1050 kW are
usually arranged in parallel and staged step by step to meet
Corresponding author. Tel.: +852 2766 4560; fax: +852 2765 7198.
E-mail address: befwyu@polyu.edu.hk (F.W. Yu).
chiller arrangement is considered as a direct approach to
improving the chiller COP at part load [8–15]. Some of the
chillers can be turned off while each of the operating
chillers handles a higher load when the building cooling
load drops from its design value.
Engineers recognize that using high-efficiency chillers is
the most obvious approach to designing and operating a
superior-performance chiller plant. There are many tech-
niques to improve the chiller COP under part load
conditions. Some research studies focus on using vari-
able-speed chillers and pumps to enhance their energy
performance at part load [16–21]. It is possible to raise the
chilled water set point to increase the COP of chillers
operating at part load with decreasing ambient tempera-
tures [10–12,22]. Some studies opine that the performance
of a chiller plant can be improved by using hybrid chillers
with different types of compressors or using different
energy sources and by allocating the chillers to operate at
their optimum loading points [13,23]. Yet the aforemen-
tioned techniques often are not considered thoroughly in
the chiller plant design.

0360-1323/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2006.09.004
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
3738 F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746

The primary issue of a chiller plant design is to decide the
number and size of chillers based on the year-round
cooling load demand of a building. For simplicity of
operation and maintenance and the ease of installing
chillers and pumps, most chiller plants are designed with
equally sized chillers [8,10,12,14]. Installing chillers of
unequal size, in fact, is a possible means to enhance the
flexibility of chillers in handling various part loads while
meeting the changing building cooling load [13,24–26].
However, there is limited evidence to support this
arrangement and the potential electricity savings due to
this arrangement have not been fully realized. This is
attributable to the lack of applicable data for the
evaluation of chiller COP at part load and the absence of
a clear picture of how the building cooling load varies
hourly with the outdoor temperature at various times of
the year due to the convention of peak load calculation. In
addition, very few investigations have been carried out on
the interaction between the chiller load and building-
cooling load with respect to various chiller plant designs.
This paper explains how a chiller plant should be designed
to enable the chillers to operate frequently with maximum
performance. It first evaluates the year-round cooling
demand of a hotel by use of the simulation program
TRNSYS [27]. Four design options with respect to the
number and size of chillers were studied for the hotel’s chiller
plant. The schedule of staging chillers for each design option
was discussed. This schedule, together with the cooling load
demand of the hotel, was used to determine how the chiller
load varied at different building load ratios. Using the chiller
part load performance curves developed from a sophisticated
chiller model [6], the annual electricity consumption of the
chillers and pumps was assessed for each design option.
Following that, there is a discussion on how to properly
stage multiple chillers and how to split the total cooling
capacity of a chiller plant into different proportions in order
to select chillers of different sizes.
2. Evaluation of the year-round cooling load demand of a
hotel
In the calculation of hourly building cooling loads,
detailed features of an existing hotel in Hong Kong [7] were
compiled into a building description file for the multi-zone
building model in TRNSYS [27]. As Table 1 illustrates, the
features include the envelope orientation, construction,
ventilation and air-conditioning requirements, occupancy,
equipment power density, and operating schedules. The
hotel is a representative of the trade and has average
characteristics in terms of the number of guestrooms, total
floor area and annual electricity consumption in kWh/unit
floor area of the building in m2. It is expected that the hotel
has representative cooling requirement and energy perfor-
mance for a large group of local hotels. The hourly local
weather data in 1989 were used because 1989 was the test
reference year (TRY). TRY is considered representative of
the prevailing weather conditions in Hong Kong in terms
of comparative energy analysis, which is appropriate for
this particular study [28–30]. It should be noted that the
cooling loads calculated from TRNSYS are simply the
idealised energy required to maintain indoor temperature
set points and the results are not system-specific. In
connection with this, it was assumed that every piece of
air-handling equipment is capable of delivering the cooling

Table 1
General information about the hotel and its HVAC systems

General
Total air-conditioned area (m2) 45540 (87.5% of gross floor area)
Orientation NW/NE/SE/SW
Window to wall ratio NW/SE: 0.6, SW/NE: 0.3
U-values of wall/window/roof (W/m2 1C) 1.9/5.4/0.7
Shading coefficient of glass 0.55
Area Guestrooms Shops and restaurants

Floor dimension (L  W) (m) 55  48 with a central void of 18  35 55  48

Area/floor (m2) 2010 2640
Air-conditioned area/floor (m2) 2010 1560
Number of floors 18 6
Cooling set point (oC) 24 22
Relative humidity (%) 50 50
Ventilation rate (L/s/person) 7.5 5
Occupancy (m2/person) 18 5
Equipment power density (W/m2) 12 50
Lighting power density (W/m2) 18 35
HVAC system operating hours
Weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays 0100–2400 0800–2300
Airside system details
Type of air handling units Fan coil units CAV and fan coil units
Chilled water flow control 2-way valve 2-way valve
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746 3739

energy required to meet the cooling demand for the 3. Analysis

thermal conditions specified in each zone and that the
operation of chillers with different arrangements is able to
satisfy perfectly the changing building cooling load. The
controllability and dynamic response of the airside and
water equipment are disregarded in this steady-state
performance analysis.
Table 2 shows how the building cooling load data are
distributed in different ranges of outdoor temperatures.
The number of hourly data collected is grouped into
different ranges of building load ratios for each range of
outdoor temperatures. The hotel has an annual cooling
energy of 17,692,414 kWh and there are 8092 cooling
hours, which account for 92.4% of the total 8760 h/yr. The
building load ratio appears to increase with the outdoor
temperature, though a certain range of building load ratios
could be present at a large group of outdoor temperatures.
The chiller plant would operate most frequently at a
building load ratio of 0.5–0.6 for 16.4% of the total
operating hours and the chillers need to satisfy a building
load ratio of 0.9–1 for only 1.5% of the total operating
hours. It is desirable to design the number and capacity of
chillers running at full or near full load conditions as much
as possible in the prevailing building cooling loads in order
to increase their COP.
3.1. Four design options for the hotel’s chiller plant
According to ASHRAE’s recommendation, any plant
capacity should be sized to cope with the building cooling
demand for 97.5% of the total operating time [31]. To
comply with this recommendation, the total cooling
capacity of the chiller plant was designed to satisfy the
hotel’s peak load of 4753 kW. Table 3 illustrates the four
design options (OP1–OP4) proposed for the chiller plant
studied. Options OP1 and OP2 are typically used in many
existing air-cooled chiller plants where chillers are of equal
size. Options OP3 and OP4, which contain chillers of
different sizes, are not used often, but these options serve to
increase the number of steps of the total cooling capacity
(please see discussion below), allowing the chillers to
operate more frequently at full load. Each chiller was
coupled with a constant-speed pump to deliver its nominal
flow of chilled water. With regard to the single-loop
pumping system for each design option, there was a
differential pressure by-pass pipe to balance the flow of
chilled water supplied by the staged chillers against the
demand of chilled water required by the airside system
coils.

Table 2
Frequency distribution of the hourly data of building load ratios for the hotel

Outdoor Building load ratio (building cooling load expressed as a ratio of its peak value) Subtotal
temperature (1C)
0–0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3 0.3–0.4 0.4–0.5 0.5–0.6 0.6–0.7 0.7–0.8 0.8–0.9 0.9–1

11–13 70 47 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 117
13–15 55 199 12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 266
15–17 148 289 112 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 551
17–19 135 193 316 76 0 0 0 0 0 0 720
19–21 78 229 217 302 121 0 0 0 0 0 947
21–23 9 62 221 199 186 108 6 0 0 0 791
23–25 1 8 88 292 182 285 118 14 0 0 988
25–27 0 0 11 77 250 352 330 101 26 0 1147
27–29 0 0 3 6 78 553 242 412 126 56 1476
29–31 0 0 0 0 13 30 61 528 135 62 829
31–33 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 112 140 0 254
33–35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 4 1 6
Subtotal 496 1027 980 954 830 1328 759 1168 431 119 8092

Table 3
Number and size of chillers and pumps for design options OP1–OP4

Design option OP1 OP2 OP3 OP4

Total cooling capacity (kW) 4852 4859 4758 4846

Total number of chillers 4 6 4 6
Number of chillers for each capacity 4 6 2 2 2 2 2
Nominal cooling capacity (kW) 1213 810 1447 929 1045 810 568
COP at full load at an outdoor temperature of 35 1C 3.1 3.1 3.1 3.1 3.1 3.1 3.1
Number of constant speed pumps for each chiller capacity 4 6 2 2 2 2 2
Design flow rate of each pump (L/s) 50.4 33.7 60.6 38.8 43.5 33.7 23.6
Rated power of each pump (kW) 21.0 14.0 25.3 16.2 18.1 14.0 9.8
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
3740 F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746

3.2. Schedules of staging chillers with design options
OP1–OP4
Given that air-cooled chillers with constant-speed
compressors operate normally with maximum COP at full
load, chiller sequencing was implemented under which all
the chillers operate at the same part load, and no additional
chillers in the chiller arrangement start to operate until
each of the operating chillers is running at full load.
Following this strategy for staging chillers, it is possible to
investigate how the chiller load changes in response to the
frequency distribution of building cooling loads shown in
Table 2 and the variations in the overall electricity
consumption due to this change.
Tables 4–7 show how the chillers with the four design
options were staged to implement chiller sequencing when
the building load ratio reached a certain level. Under
options OP1 and OP2 with equally sized chillers, one more
chiller would be staged when the building cooling load
exceeded the total capacity of the staged chillers. Based on
this, the total cooling capacity of operating chillers
increases in equal steps and the number of steps
corresponds to the total number of chillers installed. The
minimum part load ratio of the operating chillers rises with
the step of their total cooling capacity. According to the
principle of chiller sequencing, the minimum chiller part
load ratio for a given step of total cooling capacity is
calculated by the total capacity at its previous step over the
total capacity at that step. The maximum part load ratio is
one when the chillers operate at full load. The minimum
and maximum part load ratios present the possible change
of chiller operating conditions for a given range of building
load ratios.
More steps of total cooling capacity mean that the
chillers are able to operate more frequently at full or near
full load conditions to meet various building cooling loads.

Table 4
Schedule of staging chillers and ranges of chiller part load ratios with design option OP1

Building load ratio Number of operating chillers Total cooling capacity of Step Chiller part load ratio
(BLR) and their capacity (kW) operating chillers (kW)
Minimum Maximum

0oBLRp0.26 1  1213 1213 1 0.20 1

0.26oBLRp0.51 2  1213 2426 2 0.50 1
0.51oBLRp0.77 3  1213 3639 3 0.67 1
0.77oBLRp1 4  1213 4852 4 0.75 0.98

Table 5
Schedule of staging chillers and ranges of chiller part load ratios with design option OP2

Building load ratio Number of operating chillers Total cooling capacity of Step Chiller part load ratio
(BLR) and their capacity (kW) operating chillers (kW)
Minimum Maximum

0oBLRp0.17 1  810 810 1 0.29 1

0.17oBLRp0.34 2  810 1620 2 0.50 1
0.34oBLRp0.51 3  810 2429 3 0.67 1
0.51oBLRp0.68 4  810 3239 4 0.75 1
0.68oBLRp0.85 5  810 4049 5 0.80 1
0.85oBLRp1 6  810 4859 6 0.83 0.98

Table 6
Schedule of staging chillers and ranges of chiller part load ratios with design option OP3

Building load ratio Number of operating chillers Total cooling capacity of Step Chiller part load ratio
(BLR) and their capacity (kW) operating chillers (kW)
Minimum Maximum

0oBLRp0.20 1  929 929 1 0.26 1

0.20oBLRp0.30 1  1447 1447 2 0.64 1
0.30oBLRp0.39 2  929 1858 3 0.78 1
0.39oBLRp0.51 1  929+1  1447 2376 4 0.78 1
0.51oBLRp0.61 2  1447 2895 5 0.82 1
0.61oBLRp0.70 2  929+1  1447 3305 6 0.88 1
0.70oBLRp0.80 1  929+2  1447 3824 7 0.86 1
0.80oBLRp1 2  929+2  1447 4753 8 0.80 1.00
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F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746 3741

Table 7
Schedule of staging chillers and ranges of chiller part load ratios with design option OP4

Building load Number of operating chillers Total cooling capacity of Step Chiller part load ratio
ratio (BLR) and their capacity (kW) operating chillers (kW)
Minimum Maximum

0oBLRp0.12 1  568 568 1 0.420 1

0.12oBLRp0.17 1  810 810 2 0.701 1
0.17oBLRp0.22 1  1045 1045 3 0.775 1
0.22oBLRp0.24 2  568 1136 4 0.920 1
0.24oBLRp0.29 1  568+1  810 1378 5 0.824 1
0.29oBLRp0.33 1  568+1  1045 1613 6 0.854 1
0.33oBLRp0.34 2  810 1620 7 0.996 1
0.34oBLRp0.39 1  810+1  1045 1855 8 0.873 1
0.39oBLRp0.41 2  568+1  810 1946 9 0.953 1
0.41oBLRp0.44 2  1045 2090 10 0.931 1
0.44oBLRp0.46 2  568+1  1045 2181 11 0.958 1
0.46oBLRp0.47 1  568+2  810 2188 12 0.997 1
0.47oBLRp0.51 1  568+1  810+1  1045 2423 13 0.903 1
0.51oBLRp0.56 1  568+2  1045 2658 14 0.911 1
0.56oBLRp0.57 2  810+1  1045 2665 15 0.998 1
0.57oBLRp0.58 2  568+2  810 2755 16 0.967 1
0.58oBLRp0.61 1  810+2  1045 2900 17 0.950 1
0.61oBLRp0.63 2  568+1  810+1  1045 2991 18 0.970 1
0.63oBLRp0.68 2  568+2  1045 3226 19 0.927 1
0.68oBLRp0.69 1  568+2  810+1  1045 3233 20 0.998 1
0.69oBLRp0.73 1  568+1  810+2  1045 3468 21 0.932 1
0.73oBLRp0.78 2  810+2  1045 3710 22 0.935 1
0.78oBLRp0.80 2  568+2  810+1  1045 3801 23 0.976 1
0.80oBLRp0.85 2  568+1  810+2  1045 4036 24 0.942 1
0.85oBLRp0.90 1  568+2  810+2  1045 4278 25 0.943 1
0.90oBLRp1 2  568+2  810+2  1045 4846 26 0.883 0.98

Options OP3 and OP4 present the opportunity to use
unequally sized chillers in the chiller plant in order to allow
the chillers to operate more frequently with maximum COP
at full load. With regard to option OP3 where the chiller
plant contains two large and two small chillers, there are
eight steps of total cooling capacity. The chillers would
operate at a part load ratio of 0.8 or above for building
load ratios ranging widely from 0.51 to 1 which accounts
for about half of the total operating hours. When six
chillers under option OP4 are split into three different
capacities, the number of steps of total cooling capacity
further increases to 26. Starting from a building load ratio
of 0.22, the chillers under option OP4 would operate at a
minimum part load ratio of around 0.9.
3.3. Calculation of the annual electricity consumption of
chillers and pumps
The thermodynamic chiller model given in Ref. [6] was
used to compute the annual electricity consumption of
chillers for each design option, given the year-round
cooling load demand of the hotel and the schedule of
staging chillers at various building load ratios. The model
was developed using TRNSYS and able to determine
accurately how the electrical power of air-cooled chillers
changes hourly in response to various load and
ambient conditions. The model considers the real process
phenomena, including the capacity control of constant
speed reciprocating compressors and mechanistic relations
between chiller components. In simulating the operation of
a chiller of any given size, the compressors and the
condenser satisfy the mass balance of refrigerant and the
energy balance at the evaporator. An algorithm was
introduced to compute the number of staged condenser
fans based on a set point of condensing temperature. The
model was experimentally verified by an error analysis,
which enabled all operating variables to be accurately
predicted. Fig. 1 shows the part load performance curves
developed from the chiller model. These curves are
generally applicable to describing the steady-state beha-
viour of the COP of air-cooled reciprocating chillers with a
nominal cooling capacity of 568–1450 kW. Using this set of
curves can give a more accurate estimation of the annual
chiller electricity consumption when compared with the
simplified chiller performance curve used generally in
commercial software for chiller simulation.
Each design option involved a single-loop pumping
system whereby the chillers and constant-speed pumps
operated as pairs in order to deliver the required flow of
chilled water. Given this situation, the electricity consump-
tion of pumps varied step by step, depending on the
number of chillers staged. The overall annual electricity
consumption of the chiller plant is the sum of chiller power
and pump power for all operating hours.

3742 F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746
6 chillers at part load with various outdoor temperatures by
Outdoor temperatures
5 15°C
20°C
25°C
Chiller COP
4 30°C
35°C
3
2 chiller COP varies across the entire range of building load
1 the COP data tend to be gathered together within the same
0.2 0.4 0.6
Chiller part load ratio
Fig. 1. Chiller part load performance curves.
4. Results
4.1. Frequency distribution of the hourly data of chiller part
load ratios
Based on the frequency distribution of hourly building
cooling loads in Table 2 and the relationship between the
building load ratio and the possible range of chiller part load
ratios given in Tables 4–7, it is possible to analyse how the
chiller part load ratios vary hourly in different ranges of
outdoor temperatures. Tables 8–11 summarize the frequency
distribution of chiller part load ratios for design options
OP1–OP4. The minimum part load ratio which the first lead
chiller handled depends on the nominal cooling capacity of
that chiller and increases from 0.20 for OP1, followed by 0.26
for OP3, 0.29 for OP2 and 0.42 for OP4. Given that different
options provide different numbers of steps of total cooling
capacity, the chillers can operate more frequently at or near
full load for a given building load ratio when the number of
steps of total cooling capacity increases. When the number of
steps of total cooling capacity rises from 4 for OP1, followed
by 6 for OP2, 8 for OP3 and 26 for OP4, the percentage of
total operating hours in which the chillers operated at a part
load ratio of 0.9–1 increases from 18.4% for OP1, followed
by 29.0% for OP2, 45.7% for OP3 and 78.7% for OP4.
Under multiple chiller arrangements, the individual
chiller loads are totally different from the building cooling
loads and have their own uniqueness with respect to each
chiller plant design. With regard to options OP1–OP4, the
chillers could operate near full load at a wide range of
outdoor temperatures of 11.0–33.7 1C. This operating
condition is not covered in the rating condition given in
the Air-conditioning and Refrigeration Institute (ARI)
Standard 590 for the performance rating of air-cooled
chillers [32]. The ARI rating condition for part load
operation states that chiller part load ratios ranging from
0.33 to 1 are linearly related to outdoor temperatures
ranging from 12.5 to 35 1C. The diverse combination of
chiller loads and outdoor temperatures reported here
suggests that it is inaccurate to calculate the COP of
ARTICLE IN PRESS
use of a single chiller performance curve based on the ARI
rating condition.
4.2. Variations in chiller COP at different building load
ratios
Based on the changes in the chiller loads in response to
the building cooling loads, it is possible to analyse how the
ratios for design options OP1–OP4. As Fig. 2 illustrates,
0.8 1.0
step of total cooling capacity with a given number and size
of operating chillers. The chiller COP fluctuates signifi-
cantly when the number or size of staged chillers varies.
When more numbers of chillers are staged, each of them
could operate at a higher part load, thereby resulting in less
fluctuation in their COP. With more numbers of steps of
total cooling capacity, the chiller COP tends to shift up
with less variation across the building load ratios. The
average COP rose from 2.91 for OP1, followed by 3.11 for
OP2, 3.12 for OP3 and 3.28 for OP4, with regard to a
situation where the number of steps of total cooling
capacity increased from four for OP1, followed by six for
OP2, eight for OP3 and 26 for OP4. It is interesting to
observe that the average COPs with options OP2–OP4 are
higher than the nominal COP of 3.1 at full load specified by
chiller manufacturers. This is because the performance of
air-cooled chillers can be improved from the COP of 3.1
when they operate at higher part loads with reduced
outdoor temperatures (see Fig. 1).
4.3. Annual electricity consumption of chillers and pumps
Having identified all hourly COP data and the schedules
of staging chillers for the hotel’s cooling load demand, it is
possible to calculate how much electricity is consumed by
chillers and pumps in the chiller plant with design options
OP1–OP4. The annual electricity consumption of chillers
and pumps is normalized by the gross floor area of the
hotel, in kWh/m2. As Table 12 illustrates, the annual
electricity consumption of the chillers reduced by 9.5%
when the number of steps of total cooling capacity
increased from four with OP1 to 26 with OP4.
When the number of steps of total cooling capacity
increased, the electricity saving of pumps rose along with
that of chillers. Chillers and pumps normally operate as
pairs with regard to the single-loop pumping system for
chilled water circulation. Since the chilled water pumps are
constant-speed devices and assuming pumping efficiency is
constant for each pump selection, the pumps’ electricity
consumption is constant when they are running—regard-
less of the chiller load. Therefore, operating the chillers at
or near full load helps minimizes the impact of the
pumping energy. Fig. 3 shows how the hourly pump power
varied across the building load ratios for design options
OP1–OP4. The potential of saving pump power is high
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746 3743

Table 8
Frequency distribution of the hourly data of chiller part load ratios for design option OP1

Outdoor Chiller part load ratio Subtotal

temperature (1C)
0–0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3 0.3–0.4 0.4–0.5 0.5–0.6 0.6–0.7 0.7–0.8 0.8–0.9 0.9–1

11–13 0 0 6 67 40 3 1 0 0 0 117
13–15 0 2 34 25 88 48 39 21 5 4 266
15–17 0 8 116 25 83 117 74 51 38 39 551
17–19 0 3 74 62 64 194 101 65 82 75 720
19–21 0 1 37 45 74 209 207 200 123 51 947
21–23 0 0 3 7 5 167 153 192 130 134 791
23–25 0 0 0 1 1 69 235 352 206 124 988
25–27 0 0 0 0 0 7 122 351 381 286 1147
27–29 0 0 0 0 0 1 133 571 314 457 1476
29–31 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 432 107 289 829
31–33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 133 90 31 254
33–35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 5 0 6
Subtotal 0 14 270 232 355 815 1066 2369 1481 1490 8092

Table 9
Frequency distribution of the hourly data of chiller part load ratios for design option OP2

Outdoor Chiller part load ratio Subtotal

temperature (1C)
0–0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3 0.3–0.4 0.4–0.5 0.5–0.6 0.6–0.7 0.7–0.8 0.8–0.9 0.9–1

11–13 0 0 0 0 25 48 34 8 1 1 117
13–15 0 0 3 32 1 52 62 56 27 33 266
15–17 0 0 8 92 39 88 88 113 76 47 551
17–19 0 0 3 44 48 117 157 150 124 77 720
19–21 0 0 1 26 22 84 156 293 221 144 947
21–23 0 0 0 1 7 43 70 241 263 166 791
23–25 0 0 0 0 0 9 74 259 355 291 988
25–27 0 0 0 0 0 0 21 159 512 455 1147
27–29 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 176 893 404 1476
29–31 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 310 516 829
31–33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 48 206 254
33–35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 4 6
Subtotal 0 0 15 195 142 441 665 1458 2832 2344 8092

Table 10
Frequency distribution of the hourly data of chiller part load ratios for design option OP3

Outdoor Chiller part load ratio Subtotal

temperature (1C)
0–0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3 0.3–0.4 0.4–0.5 0.5–0.6 0.6–0.7 0.7–0.8 0.8–0.9 0.9–1

11–13 0 0 0 8 55 43 9 1 1 0 117
13–15 0 0 27 9 11 61 66 39 35 18 266
15–17 0 0 54 74 20 29 119 116 88 51 551
17–19 0 0 22 60 49 54 84 136 184 131 720
19–21 0 0 10 31 29 63 73 145 353 243 947
21–23 0 0 0 4 5 3 29 96 343 311 791
23–25 0 0 0 0 1 1 5 71 436 474 988
25–27 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 16 437 692 1147
27–29 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 492 980 1476
29–31 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 151 678 829
31–33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 134 120 254
33–35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 4 2 6
Subtotal 0 0 113 186 170 254 387 624 2658 3700 8092
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3744 F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746

Table 11
Frequency distribution of the hourly data of chiller part load ratios for design option OP4

Outdoor Chiller part load ratio Subtotal

temperature (1C)
0–0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3 0.3–0.4 0.4–0.5 0.5–0.6 0.6–0.7 0.7–0.8 0.8–0.9 0.9–1

11–13 0 0 0 0 0 1 17 45 37 17 117
13–15 0 0 0 0 28 7 1 60 80 90 266
15–17 0 0 0 0 64 54 19 101 151 162 551
17–19 0 0 0 0 24 34 33 70 219 340 720
19–21 0 0 0 0 10 24 13 78 231 591 947
21–23 0 0 0 0 0 3 4 12 146 626 791
23–25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 103 884 988
25–27 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 16 1131 1147
27–29 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 30 1446 1476
29–31 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 6 823 829
31–33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 254 254
33–35 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 5 6
Subtotal 0 0 0 0 126 123 87 367 1020 6369 8092

Fig. 2. Chiller coefficient of performance at different building load ratios for design options (a) OP1, (b) OP2, (c) OP3 and (d) OP4.

Table 12 when unequally sized chillers are used with an increased

Annual electricity consumption of chillers and pumps with design options number of steps of total cooling capacity.
OP1–OP4 The extent to which the annual pumping energy could be
saved, indeed, depends on how much chilled water flows
Design option OP1 OP2 OP3 OP4
across the waterside and airside systems. Different design
Number of steps of total cooling capacity options result in different amounts of system-chilled water
4 6 8 26 at different ranges of building load ratios. When the
Annual electricity consumption (kWh/m ) 2 number of steps of total cooling capacity increases, the flow
Chiller 136.4 127.8 127.4 123.4 of system-chilled water can drop in various degrees while
Pump 9.0 8.2 7.8 7.3 meeting the building-cooling load. This is because the
Total 145.4 136.0 135.2 130.7
chillers operate at higher loads with a higher temperature
Percentage of electricity saving in relation to OP1 (%) rise of chilled water. For any given building cooling load,
Chiller — 6.3 6.6 9.5 the flow of system-chilled water and the corresponding
Pump — 8.9 13.3 18.9
pump power are minimized if the staged chillers operate at
Total — 6.5 7.0 10.1
full load along with a 5.5 1C difference between the
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746
Fig. 3. Variation in chilled water pump power with design options
OP1–OP4.
temperature of supply-chilled water and that of return-
chilled water.
5. Discussion
Having identified the potential benefits of using un-
equally sized chillers, it is necessary to discuss how to
implement chiller sequencing for these chillers and how to
arrange their sizes in order to meet the total cooling
capacity of a chiller plant.
For a chiller plant containing chillers of equal size, the
implementation of chiller sequencing is straightforward
and is based entirely on the load conditions of individual
chillers. One more chiller needs to be staged as long as each
staged chiller operates at above full load, and one of the
staged chillers can be switched off when their part load
ratio drops to below (Nch 1)/Nch, where Nch is the number
of staged chillers. If identical chillers in a single-loop
pumping system are balanced to carry equal flows of
chilled water, the chillers can be staged based simply on the
system-mixed temperatures of return-chilled water and
supply-chilled water.
When unequally sized chillers are installed in a chiller
plant, it is impossible to simply switch these chillers on or
off based on their load conditions because they can be
staged in various combinations to meet the requirements of
building cooling load. It is critical to determine building
cooling load in addition to the load conditions of each
chiller in order to successfully implement chiller sequen-
cing. The evaluation of a building-cooling load involves
measuring the flow and temperature of chilled water at the
supply and return headers linking all air-handling units.
To achieve the benefits of using unequally sized chillers, it
is important to understand how to split their total cooling
capacity into different proportions. It is generally preferable
to have even numbers of chillers of the same capacity, in
order to make the operation and maintenance of chillers
and pumps more flexible and reliable. With regard to small
to medium-scale buildings requiring a cooling capacity of
3745
1050–7032 kW, it is reasonable to install two to three
groups of chillers of different sizes in a chiller plant. With
more groups of chillers, the number of steps of total cooling
capacity increases considerably, allowing the chillers to
operate more frequently at full load. As with the design
options OP1, OP3 or OP4 for the hotel’s chiller plant, each
of them involves four chillers of a single size, four chillers of
two different sizes or six chillers of three different sizes,
respectively. The corresponding number of steps of total
cooling capacity is 4, 8 or 26, respectively.
When a chiller plant contains four chillers of two
different sizes, the nominal capacity of small chillers
should not be half of that of large chillers, because
operating either two small chillers or one large chiller
results in the same total cooling capacity. When chiller
sequencing is implemented, this ambiguous staging of
chillers will decrease the effective step of total cooling
capacity. To avoid this ambiguous staging of chillers, it is
possible that the total cooling capacity is split into a ratio
of 2:3. That is, there are two small chillers, each carrying
20% of the total capacity, and two large chillers, each
carrying 30% of the total capacity. With this arrangement
of chillers, eight distinct steps of total cooling capacity can
be achieved to deal with a series of building-load ratios:
0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7, 0.8 and 1.
When a chiller plant consists of chillers of three different
sizes, the split of total cooling capacity should be carefully
considered, because an ambiguous staging of chillers may
occur. Based on the design option OP4 shown in Table 7, it
is possible that within 26 steps of total cooling capacity,
four steps at building load ratios of 0.34, 0.46, 0.56 and
0.68 tend to overlap. In this situation, the effective step of
total cooling capacity will drop to 22, and this drop is, to
some extent, unavoidable. This is because the size of
chillers generally increases in a discontinuous way,
narrowing the flexibility of splitting the plant cooling
capacity into the load of individual chillers. It should be
noted that more steps of total cooling capacity will bring
more sophisticated staging of chillers. For example, with
option OP4, the number of staged chillers tends to oscillate
across the entire range of building cooling loads. The
increasing building cooling load cannot be met simply by
staging more chillers, because the sizes of these chillers
strongly influence the extent to which their composite
cooling capacity can rise to meet the building-cooling load.
It is essential to provide a detailed monitoring of the
cooling capacity of individual chillers of different sizes and
of their combined cooling capacity. A building manage-
ment system (BMS) is a prerequisite for facilitating this
monitoring. With a BMS, the schedule of staging unequally
sized chillers can be programmed to automatically imple-
ment chiller sequencing.
6. Conclusions
This paper provides insights into how the number and
size of chillers in a chiller plant should be selected to enable
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
3746 F.W. Yu, K.T. Chan / Building and Environment 42 (2007) 3737–3746
the chillers to operate frequently with maximum perfor-
mance. The year-round cooling load demand of a hotel
was determined using TRNSYS. Four design options
with respect to the number and size of chillers were studied
for the hotel’s chiller plant. The unique frequency
distribution of chiller loads was described for each design
option. It is possible to use the number of steps of total
cooling capacity to analyse the frequency of chillers
operating at or near full load. Using a set of chiller part
load performance curves, the variation in chiller COP and
the annual electricity consumption of chillers and pumps
were assessed for each design option. This assessment
shows that unequally sized chillers should be installed in a
chiller plant to enhance the number of steps of total cooling
capacity, thereby enabling the chillers to operate more
frequently near full load with improved performance. The
annual electricity consumption of chillers and pumps could
be saved by 10.1% when the chiller plant was designed with
six chillers of three different sizes instead of four equally
sized chillers.
This paper will give designers and researchers a better
idea about how chiller part load performance curves can be
used to evaluate improvements in the energy performance
of a chiller plant with alternative designs. Designers and
researchers will better understand how to properly stage
multiple chillers and how to split the total cooling capacity
of a chiller plant into different chiller sizes. It is hoped that
unequally sized chillers can be widely implemented and
integrated with other energy efficient technologies so they
can operate highly efficiently with a considerable decrease
in the overall electricity consumption. It remains to be seen
how overall engineering economics (i.e., life-cycle-cost
analysis) can help determine if the electricity savings are
worth the increased capital and maintenance costs for
multiple chillers of different sizes.
Acknowledgement
The work described in this paper was supported by a
grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong
SAR, China (Project no. PolyU 5112/05E).
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