Almost 400 guests came together for the event, which was held at Manchester’s Midland Hotel and hosted by Sky Sports presenter Jeff Stelling.
Refrigeration specialist Star Refrigeration and client Lineage Logistics picked up the award for the project, built by Russells Construction. The £10m scheme was the latest in a series of cold store builds for Yearsley Logistics which was bought out by Lineage prior to the completion of construction.
The planning, design and build was been undertaken by Russells’ specialist logistics development team, who worked closely with Star and Lineage to develop the design for the 75,000m3 facility and its 15,000 pallet spaces of frozen warehouse capacity. The team also involved AEW architects, engineers Healey Consulting, cladding specialists ISD Solutions and Schaeffer Racking.
The judges felt the project demonstrated significant innovation and a commitment to customer service, along with the reduction in emissions to just one third of the UK’s ‘Best Practice’ guidelines after Star modified its bespoke equipment to achieve better than planned efficiency to help reduce running costs.
In summarising the project, the awards organisers said: _“The Peterborough project has seen the installation of a cold store plant with a refrigeration capacity of 600kW.
“Results from recent energy performance data analysis indicate that the Azanefreezer 2.0’s annual energy usage is set to cut carbon emission by 453 tonnes of CO2 per year compared to the UK’s ‘Best Practice’ guidelines.
“Star was able to secure the contract through its offer of two independent AF300-S Azanefreezer 2.0 ammonia refrigeration plants.
“Star modified its existing AF300 unit by retaining the existing low-pressure receiver and compressors, but upgrading the unit’s condenser and base frame to a larger size.
“This allowed it to achieve a higher efficiency than that required by the performance specification, thus reducing running costs.
“The use of a larger condenser allowed the facility to operate on 32.2kW for its evaporators, an 8.1% improvement on STS’s requirement, and 12.5kW for its condenser, a 58.3% improvement.
“The Azanefreezer 2.0 is a modular, low charge packaged ammonia freezer with patented low pressure receiver design which is unique to Star.”_
Jonathan Rhodes heads the specialist team for Russells, having worked on all nine of the Yearsley / Lineage projects to date, totalling almost 1million sq ft. He said: “The building fabric was carefully selected to allow the external envelope to be fully sealed to ensure a consistent internal temperature of minus 30 degrees and prevent moisture entering the cold store chamber.
“This not only prevents the creation of ice build-up but also reduces the operational cooling costs. Thanks to Star’s innovation we were able to introduce a new refrigeration system which also acts to prevent ice build-up and cut ongoing costs, which is built off site, thereby also reducing installation time. This one innovation will help to save the client time and money in the short and long term.
“This reduction in charge, coupled with zero global warming potential of this system, provides the environmentally responsible solution both we and the client require. When run at full operational performance it is a cost-effective choice, helping to reduce running costs and combat greenhouse gas emissions. This helps Lineage to maintain its commitment to reducing environmental impact, while also increasing provision for customers.”
