Dubai, UAE, 10 June 2018: Digitisation can play a vital role in maintaining operating reliability and ensuring asset protection, said Arjan Boogaards, Senior Vice President and President, Middle East and Africa (MEA) region, Ecolab, speaking in the context of the company’s 3D Trasar Technology for cooling boilers and membranes, which, he said, helps to reduce water usage by as much as 30%. Boogaards said: “In some countries where water is cheap, you may say that is not a lot, but in these parts, it is more scarce. It will get even scarcer, and prices may go up. Municipalities in the Emirates are very concerned about water scarcity and drive programmes to lower consumption in large water [consumers] like District Cooling providers.”

The technology, Boogaards said, aims to provide visibility in the organisation across multiple plants, with engineers in system assurance centres remotely monitoring the chemical treatment programme’s performance, and intervening immediately, if needed, to ensure systems operate with the lowest possible water consumption.

Further highlighting the benefits that implementing proper controls have on District Cooling operations, Boogaards said this could also positively impact energy consumption. “Let me focus on what I think is critical in all cooling applications,” he said, “especially in chillers: keeping the surface clean. That sounds simple, but there are three things that influence the cleanliness of service: microbiological fouling, scaling and corrosion. These are the three things in chillers you have to control. Fouling means less heat transfer, more energy consumption.” Boogaards said that with the government’s increasing emphasis towards addressing water consumption and in view of the energy-saving opportunities inherent in such technologies, he is optimistic the market will grow exponentially in the coming years.

Boogaards said the company also believes that data centres will drive demand for relevant technologies in the region, based on the trends Ecolab has observed from its portfolio of activities abroad. “There are roughly more than 100 small-scale data centres across Middle East and Africa,” he said. “In the region, we are not on the same scale as you see in the rest of the world. This is beginning to change with Microsoft and Amazon announcing they are going to build large-scale centres in the UAE and Bahrain in 2019.”  He added that the company cultivates a strong relationship with Microsoft, citing Ecolab as “the preferred data centre cooling partner for Microsoft globally”.

Speaking on the company’s strategy, Boogaards said that, traditionally, Ecolab has focused on targeting end-users and large OEM manufacturers and they have also established connections with FM companies, stakeholders that play a vital role in operating District Cooling plants.

Hannah Jo Uy is Assistant Editor at Climate Control Middle East magazine. She may be contacted at hannah@cpi-industry.com