Problems of safe operation of ammonia refrigeration units

The recent trend towards expanding the scope of application of environmentally friendly natural refrigerants, including ammonia, has caused an increased interest of the refrigeration community in the safety problems of ammonia refrigeration units (ACU). It is known that ammonia has two significant drawbacks: it is toxic at concentrations in air above 0.02 mg/dm3 and explosive at concentrations in air of 16...28% by volume. In large refrigeration systems containing large amounts of ammonia, the possibility of leakage accidents is greatly increased. Therefore, the main task when working on ammonia as a refrigerant is to reduce the ammonia capacity of refrigeration units.
It was precisely this problem and methods of solving it, both technical and economic, normative and legal, that was devoted to the scientific and technical conference held in Moscow on April 11–13, 2001 “On measures to reduce the risk of accidents and emergencies during the operation of facilities using ammonia refrigeration units (AHU), based on the reduction of ammonia capacity and improvement of cold production technology”.
The initiator of the conference was the State Institute for the Design of Refrigerators, Ice Cream Factories, Dry and Water Ice and Liquid Carbon Dioxide Plants “Giprokholod”. It was organized by the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Russia, Gosgortekhnadzor of Russia and Giproholod with the support of VNIHI. The conference was attended by representatives of research and design institutes, universities, manufacturers and consumers of ammonia refrigeration equipment, enterprises involved in automation systems, organizations engaged in the protection of the population.
The interest in the problem of ACS safety of such various departments indicates its relevance and the need to develop a unified approach to this problem, on the basis of which each department will be able to implement effective measures to reduce the risk of accidents at ACS