KLCC District Cooling Plant Retrofit — Up to 60,000 RT

Scope of works

Retrofitting of the KLCC district cooling plant to 60,000 RT with thermal ice storage, 4 × 33 kV power intake and energy billing meters.

A retrofit at this scale is really two projects run as one: keeping an operating district cooling plant serving the KLCC precinct while rebuilding it, and delivering the enlarged plant — up to 60,000 RT with thermal ice storage — that the precinct's growth demanded. The sequencing of chiller changeover, the temporary hydraulic arrangements and the protection of supply to connected buildings governed the programme as much as the new plant design did.

The electrical side is a project in its own right: a 4 × 33 kV power intake sized for the plant's full build-out, coordinated with TNB, with energy billing meters closing the commercial loop between the plant and the buildings it serves. KLCC Projeks Sdn Bhd's letter on the relocation and upgrading project is reproduced on our About page.

Technical particulars

Cooling capacity

Up to 60,000 RT

Thermal storage

Thermal ice storage system

Power intake

4 × 33 kV feeders

Metering

Energy billing meters

What this kind of commission involves

A district cooling or co-generation commission runs from load modelling and commercial feasibility through to a plant that has to hold its output for twenty-five years. The engineering divides into three parts that are usually contracted separately but must be designed as one system: the central plant, the reticulation between plant and buildings, and the energy transfer station inside each connected building where the cooling is measured and sold.

Disciplines engaged

• Cooling load modelling, diversity analysis and plant staging strategy
• Chiller selection — electric centrifugal, steam or hot water absorption
• Thermal energy storage sizing and charge/discharge control (ice or chilled water)
• Primary, secondary and condenser water hydraulics; pump selection and speed control
• External chilled water reticulation — routing, sizing, expansion and thermal loss
• Energy transfer station design, heat exchanger selection and control valve authority
• Energy billing metering, measurement boundary and tariff structure
• High voltage intake, standby generation and plant electrical distribution
• Plant automation, sequencing, trending and operator interface
• Testing, commissioning and performance verification against contract kW/RT

What we watch for

The failures that recur on this building type, and where we look for them.

• Low delta-T on the consumer side, which quietly destroys plant efficiency and loop capacity
• Optimistic connected-load forecasts leading to plant that spends its life at part load
• Metering boundaries left undefined until the first disputed invoice
• Storage sized in tons instead of ton-hours, so the peak is never actually shifted

The following describes the standard engineering scope for this sector. The specific scope of any individual commission is set by its brief and contract.

Project location