What’s The Right Choice – High Pressure Air-cooled vs Water-cooled Air Compressors?
Air compressors machinery is prone to heating and exhaustive usage requires cooling. There are mainly two industry wide cooling methods adapted – air or water-cooled.
Whether you get an air-cooled or water-cooled compressor system, you must note, that these depend on variable factors like space, footprint, availability of cooling water and operation & maintenance expenses. Now, these are not simple mechanisms for any factory or utility plant to make a quick decision about which is the most suitable for them. Let us walk you through the different methods of air-cooled and water-cooled compressors for your assistance.
Requirements of an air-cooled compressor
Particularly for applications in high pressure compressed air, when we are working with products that require oil-free and clean compressed air, one can choose today to install an air-cooled compressor system. Air-cooled compressors require just adequate amounts of space for placing the unit and minimum free spacing around for free air circulation. Otherwise, we may witness temperature rise in absence of exhaust ducting and proper ventilation.
On the other hand, here we eliminate the need for complete downstream cooling water accessories and associated installation and maintenance cost, and adding the benefit of flexibility in installation site without multiple cooling components.
Requirements for a water-cooled compressor
Atlas Copco’s ZP package – True plug & play solution
The Atlas Copco ZP compressor is both oil-free and air-cooled while also being designed for immediate ‘plug and play’ installation.
The ZP uses air-cooled technology and IE3 TEFC motors suitable for a 50°C ambient environment. This technology makes accessories such as cooling water towers, and cooling water pumps redundant, resulting in lower costs and less space. Atlas Copco has also integrated sensors to optimize the availability of the machine, leading to increase reliability and lower maintenance costs.
The ZP high-pressure air compressor is ISO 50001 certified for energy efficiency management. And it comes with our patented variable speed drive technology called VSD.
Key highlights with ZP:
• PLUG & PLAY unit
Minimal installation cost thanks to compact design, integrated components, and unique base frame (no need for civil foundation or external electrical controllers).
• Air-cooled package
Designed for high ambient conditions in air-cooled variant. Takes away need for any external utility like cooling water towers, pump skid or extra installation – results in lowers cost and lesser space.
• Oil free air Class 0 quality
Either to use for PET or Water Transmission applications, ZP guarantees High quality Oil free as per ISO 8573-1 Class 0 compressed air resulting in zero risk of contamination and losses from operational downtime.
• Rod drop technology
Additional feature to reduce risk of piston/ cylinder touch, our high-pressure air compressor ZP, makes use of built-in sensors to check distance between piston rod and allows for predictive maintenance. Using SMARTLINK, enables you to always know the status of your compressor.
• Noise levels
ZP-40bar is a quiet machine in its class, with significant noise reduction as compared to other piston compressors. The canopy is designed to reduce any excessive noise to maximum of 78 dba, ensuring maximal working comfort.
• Energy Savings with VSD
Having an optional integrated onboard Variable Speed Drive (VSD) technology that closely follows your plant’s air demand and can cut down your energy cost by up to 35%.
We hope this article helped you gain a better understanding of Air-cooled vs Water-cooled Air compressors, and which one would be best suitable for your requirements. If you need more information or would like to talk to our product expert, get in touch with us today.