DESIGN NAME: Sugam
PRIMARY FUNCTION: Personal Cooling System
INSPIRATION: Air conditioning system are an integral part of our life that, we became ignorant of its harmful effect. High electricity demand and use of refrigerants in AC are one of the major driver of global warming. In large office buildings, ACs account for twenty percent of total energy demand. It is also notorious for over cooling and asymmetric cooling of occupants. Due to pandemic the office work culture has become agile and so is the need for thermal conditioning. Sugam is designed to cater the demand for agile, mobile and modular work spaces with focus on individual comfort.
UNIQUE PROPERTIES / PROJECT DESCRIPTION: Freedom, one word that drove human race from its dawn. Office spaces are no exception. COVID-19 changed the rigid lifeless machine friendly spaces of past to the present flexible, symbiotic and employee centric spaces. Sugam is an agile, modular, and mobile personal cooling system. It can be configured as both focused and collaborative spaces. It gracefully adapts and allows user to create personal environment. Sugam complements existing AC system by creating individual thermal zones than over cooling large spaces, thus economizing cooling energy demand.
OPERATION / FLOW / INTERACTION: Sugam - a freestanding modular cooling cum partition system designed to meet the cooling demand of the agile, collaborative and focused workspaces. The system comprises of upper panel module that houses the radiant cooling mats and base module that houses the water cooling unit and dehumidifying unit. Chilled water to the radiant mat is supplied from the water tank in the base module. A patented technology that does not use CFC, cools the water in the tank which is pumped to radiant mats. The patented technology also controls the air humidity, which is the villain of radiant cooling system.
PROJECT DURATION AND LOCATION: The project was started in August 2021 and completed in December 2022.
|
PRODUCTION / REALIZATION TECHNOLOGY: Doctoral research that included detailed experimental and subjective analysis to understand the applicability of radiant cooling system in humid climatic condition was revelation on the prospects of the radiant cooling system. Sugam was developed from the research and understanding on the need for a cooling system that is sustainable, agile and modular. The system is designed such that it complements the existing air conditioning system in large office spaces. Refrigerants are not used to produce cooling water in this system, which decreases the carbon footprint of the cooling system by many folds.
SPECIFICATIONS / TECHNICAL PROPERTIES: The product has three modules, two parent module and a baby module.
TAGS: Personal cooling, Workspace, Radinat cooling, Air conditioning, Micro environemnt, Sustainability, Climate change, CFC
RESEARCH ABSTRACT: In large office spaces AC accounts for 20% of energy demand. A cooling system catering to occupant demand and that negates the harmful effects of conventional AC system is the need of the hour. Due to pandemic, demand for agile and modular workspace is on the raise and so, the demand for agile cooling system. Sugam a partition cum cooling system caters the demand for agile, modular and mobile office spaces. It works on the principle of radiant cooling system. The use of the technology to supply chilled water is a boon to indoor thermal conditioning as CFCs is not used to produce chilled water.
CHALLENGE: The main challenge of this concept are
1. Identifying an efficient water cooling system to supply chilled water to the system.
2. Deriving the area of the radiant cooling panel required to achieve optimal thermal comfort in the micro zones.
3. Creation of various seating layout using minimal number of modules.
ADDED DATE: 2023-06-24 11:00:42
TEAM MEMBERS (1) : Karthikeyan Sabapathy
IMAGE CREDITS: All Image : Designer Karthikeyan Sabapathy, Researcher Dr. Jayashree Arumugam, Sugam, 2023
Video Credits : Designer Karthikeyan Sabapathy, Researcher Dr. Jayashree Arumugam, Sugam, 2023
PATENTS/COPYRIGHTS: Design patent filed
Utility patent filed
|