YORK® MODEL YK

HEAT-RECOVERY

Optimize your
CHILLER

facility’s energy
utilization with free heat
Reduce energy consumption
with sustainable technology
Take a step forward to reducing your
facility’s environmental footprint
Identifying technologies that can reduce the environmental
impact of your building at a reasonable cost is one of the
biggest challenges facing commercial, institutional, and
industrial facilities today.
As a major user of energy, heating and cooling systems hold
a key to resolving this challenge. That’s why Johnson Controls
offers a solution that addresses today’s pressing environmental
and energy issues—the YORK® heat-recovery chiller.
Substantial heat energy is available
Your chillers not only remove heat from your building’s
conditioned space, the compressors add up to 25% more
thermal energy that must also be removed. This heat is
rejected by the cooling towers, which emit a tremendous
amount of heat energy into the atmosphere. In fact, ASHRAE
Standard 90.1 6.5.6.2 estimates that a facility with a year-
round cooling load will reject a minimum of 6,000 MBH
(1,800 kW) into the ambient air.
To take advantage of that vast amount of free heat energy,
Johnson Controls offers heat-recovery technology on the
YORK Model YK centrifugal chillers ranging from 250 to 2,800
tons of refrigeration (900–9,800 kW), which can provide from
1,200 to 40,000 MBH (400–11,700 kW) heating capacity.
Heat-recovery Chiller Specification
Cooling Capacity Range 250–2,800 Tons (900–9,800 kW)
Heating Capacity Range 1,200–40,000 MBH (400–11,700 kW)
Max. Hot Water Temperature 110°F (43°C)
Refrigerant R-134a
Understanding heat-recovery chiller technology
A YORK Model YK heat-recovery chiller puts your facility’s
heat byproduct to work. Consequently, it saves energy by
decreasing the load on, and the fuel consumption of, your
facility’s boilers.
In a typical multiple-chiller plant employing heat recovery,
one chiller will be designed for heat recovery. It will usually
be the first chiller activated when cooling is required.
2
The double-bundle condenser of a heat-recovery chiller
contains the heating condenser and the tower condenser,
as shown in Figure 1. The warm refrigerant gas from the
compressor flows over both tube bundles.
The flow of heat in the double-bundle condenser is controlled
by a cooling-tower bypass valve (see Figure 2 on page 4).
The valve receives signals from a temperature sensor in
the heating circuit.
When heating is required, the tower-bypass valve directs the
water in the tower-condenser circuit to bypass the cooling
tower. Because the circuit cannot exhaust its heat, it gets
warmer and warmer, until it is the same temperature as the
refrigerant leaving the compressor, at which point it can no
longer absorb any more heat, effectively becoming inactive.
The refrigerant heat now passes into the water flowing
through the heating condenser, which carries the heat to the
heating load or to a booster boiler.
When less heat is required, the tower-bypass valve begins
to open, which causes more of the condenser heat to flow
into the tower-condenser circuit, and less heat flows into the
heating circuit.
Compressor
Heating condenser
Evaporated
Tower refrigerant gas
condenser
Evaporator
Condensed Expansion orifice
refrigerant liquid
Figure 1: Refrigerant flow in a heat-recovery chiller.
Heat-recovery benefits

Facility Types Heat-Recovery Uses Facility Types Heat-Recovery Uses

Hospitals/Medical Centers
The recovered heat can be
used to control humidity
in sensitive sites, like
laboratories and hospital
operating rooms.
Manufacturing Manufacturing facilities can
take advantage of process
heat supplied by a heat-
recovery chiller for their
process operations.

Hotels/Resorts The recovered heat can be Educational Education facilities—

used to reheat the air in dormitories, athletic
a hotel in a cooler climate. complexes, and food
Hotels can also utilize the services—can utilize heat
waste heat to preheat recovery to preheat
domestic hot water for domestic hot-water
pools, hot tubs, showers, needs for laundry, showers,
and laundry. cooking, and dishwashing.

Numerous applications
Practically any chiller plant that has simultaneous heating and
cooling needs, can utilize a heat-recovery chiller. Common
applications include hospitals and medical centers, hotels and
resorts, manufacturing facilities, and educational facilities.
Assured equipment selection
The expertise of Johnson Controls in understanding your
building environment, combined with YORK chiller-applications
experience, provides the best assurance of a proper heat-
recovery chiller selection. To produce the greatest energy
savings, we analyze the chilled-water plant to take full advantage
of your load profiles. The result is a solution that fits your
budget while reducing your facility's energy-use profile.
Energy use and cost savings
A YORK heat-recovery chiller uses less total energy than
separate cooling and heating equipment by taking advantage
of “free” condenser heat that would otherwise be lost through
the cooling towers. In effect, a heat-recovery chiller lets
you do “double-duty”—cooling and heating with the
same piece of equipment. This is more economically and
environmentally friendly than burning fossil fuels or using
electric-resistance heaters.
Environmentally friendly refrigerant
YORK heat-recovery chillers utilize HFC-134a refrigerant,
which has zero ozone-depletion potential and no phase-out
date. HFC-134a also has favorable thermodynamic properties
and specific volumes that are ideal for heat-recovery duty.
High heating COPs
The coefficient of performance (COP) of a heat-recovery
chiller in heating mode is outstanding. For example, with
chilled-water temperatures of 54°–44°F (12°–7°C)
and tower water of 85°–95°F (29–35°C), the cooling COP
could be 6.3. With hot water from 95°–105°F (35°–41°C),
the combined cooling and heating COP could be 11.4.
Low sound levels
Patented YORK OptiSound™ control technology is standard
on YORK heat-recovery chillers. This technology handles
the sound generated by chillers operating with high-
head pressures and reduced loads, which are commonly
encountered in the heat-recovery operation. With the
OptiSound control, part-load sound levels do not exceed
full-load sound levels.
Complies with ASHRAE 90.1
ASHRAE 90.1, 6.3.6.2—Heat Recovery for Service Water
Heating covers the efficient use of heat-recovery technology
in buildings. Application of a YORK heat-recovery chiller will
meet and exceed these exacting requirements to ensure
you’re getting maximum energy savings.

3
 Case study:
Global medical manufacturer
140°F
(60°C)
Heat
Exchanger
115°F
(46°C)
TC
Boiler
BWP

130°F 105°F TE
Cooling Tower
(54°C) (41°C)

Tower
Heating Condenser Bypass valve
TCV
95°F 105°F
(35°C) (41°C)

HWP Tower Condenser

Heating Load
105°F
(41°C)

Compressor
CWP

TXV Hot
Gas
Motor

42°F
(6°C)

Evaporator

52°F
(11°C)
ChWP

Figure 2: Heat-recovery chiller integrated with boiler loop. Cooling Load

Fully utilizing recovered heat
A medical manufacturing facility with simultaneous cooling
and heating requirements demonstrates the substantial energy
savings available with a YORK heat-recovery chiller.
In the configuration shown in Figure 2, heat that would otherwise
be lost is recovered in the heating condenser, to produce
105°F (41°C) water. In the winter, as the water flows through
the heat exchanger, the booster boiler adds enough heat
to raise its temperature to 130°F (54°C). The hot water is
distributed through the building to meet the comfort-heating
needs of the facility. During the summer, the boiler is not
required. The building’s heating needs can be satisfied
using 105°F (41°C) water from the chiller, enabling energy-cost
reductions year-round.
In this case, the chiller is running in heat-recovery mode
year-round. When operating in heat-recovery mode (cooling
and heating simultaneously), the cooling capacity is 405 tons
(1,424 kW). The combined cooling and heating COP value
is 10.2. If the chiller would operate in cooling-only mode,
it would have a capacity of 425 tons (1,491 kW) with a 5.7 COP.
For more information on YORK Model YK heat-recovery
chillers, contact your nearest Johnson Controls office.
Or visit us on the Internet at www.johnsoncontrols.com.

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