Federico Muñoz Sánchez, Technical Commercial Director, CEIS, has revealed to Climate Control Middle East that the company is set to launch a laboratory for air-to-air equipment in Madrid, Spain, which, he says, will be the largest in Europe. Sánchez spoke on the history of CEIS and values that underpinned this recent move: “CEIS (Testing Innovation and Services Centre) is a 100% Spanish private testing laboratory, leading the air-to-air testing technologies in Europe. Since 1994, CEIS has tested and evaluated more than 4,000 samples to check their energy performance. With this background, CEIS decided last year to increase its testing capacities, not just in terms of units under tests but also in terms of power of the units.” The introduction of the regulation, which will force energy labelling in Europe for air conditioning units above 12 kW, he said, has also had a major influence on the CEIS decision. In the coming months, “CEIS will launch the largest European laboratory for air-to-air equipment, including a VRF technology testing facility, at Móstoles in Madrid, Spain,” he added.

Sánchez added that CEIS, as a test laboratory, will be carrying out the evaluation of VRF technology based on the SEER approach and that it will be able to test equipment up to 100 kW, which in the case of the VRF, means having eight cassette indoor units or 12 ducted indoor units. He added that the laboratory is backed by both strong investment and comprehensive knowledge on test methods. He says that, since the number of VRF manufacturers is not so high, CEIS will be able to utilise its facilities in Spain to address the needs of leading manufacturers in Japan, Korea and the Middle East region.