If you run a business or a household, your energy costs are one of the biggest lines of your budget. You have to keep your household or business running smoothly without consuming more energy than you can afford. If you run a restaurant, for example, you need to be able to prepare food with heat or by cooling it. That might mean you need rapid cooling or gentle cooling and the same is true with heating. The different requirements can be served by different types of exchangers of heat. Also, you will need to keep your energy costs in mind. Which types of devices are right for you will depend on your needs and your priorities. If you are most concerned with energy costs, certain appliances will work better. If your priorities are the functionality, then there might be better options. Here are some different uses and which types of appliances will serve you best.
Food Preparation
Food preparation involves the need to heat and cool food. Sometimes you’ll need to change temperatures quickly and sometimes gradually. Dairy products such as milk and yoghurt often need to be heated gradually. If you heat dairy products, especially a product such as cheese that contains high levels of protein, it can curdle or break. When a sauce breaks, the liquid and solid components separate. If you’ve ever prepared a cheese sauce that is grainy, the problem was probably the speed at which you heated it. Free flow plate heat exchangers are great at gradual heating. They will slowly transfer heat from the plates to the food itself.
They work well because they are made of metal plates that do not actually touch. They are separated by layers of liquid that are heated and then exchange that heat with the items cooking. Alternately, they can cool your food gradually because the liquid in the exchanger will absorb the heat from the food that has been prepared. If you need a more robust exchange of heat, you will need a different type of exchanger.
HVAC
Obviously, your heating and cooling system will need more power than you would need to cool and heat sauces. The other three types of exchangers are more appropriate than free flow units. The other types are brazed plate, welded plate, and plate and frame. They are made of plates that are fixed together so that they can withstand much higher pressures in their liquid. These are used for heating and cooling purposes. A robust exchanger will absorb a large amount of heat from the atmosphere so that it can cool the air. That air is then blown into your home or business. They can also serve the opposite function. They can transfer heat to the air for heating your building.
These more robust units are also useful for industrial applications. If a brewery needs to heat wort or a machine shop needs to heat large amounts of industrial oil, they will likely need one of these. The experts who sell the appliances can advise you on which ones are going to serve your needs.