Otley: Hubbard Products to partner Dearman Engine Company in ‘liquid air’ refrigeration project

Hubbard, which is based at Otley, near Ipswich, will work with the Dearman Engine Company to use Dearman’s revolutionary liquid air engine ? which produces zero carbon emissions ? as the power source for a range of transport refrigeration units (TRUs).

The partnership was announced at the launch of a report entitled “Liquid Air on the Highway”, by the Liquid Air Energy Network, the Centre for Low Carbon Futures, and the University of Birmingham, setting out the business and environmental case for liquid air commercial vehicles.

Liquid Nitrogen is a well-known cryogenic medium and is already used as a coolant in some larger TRUs. The new units will for the first time use liquid nitrogen (or “liquid air”) as both the motive power and as a subsidiary cooling medium.

Pat Maughan, managing director of Hubbard Products said: “This is a very exciting project for Hubbard and we are extremely pleased to have been chosen as the preferred partner by the Dearman Engine Company to develop applications for their revolutionary new power source.

“At Hubbard we have always placed energy efficiency at the top of our list of performance criteria for both static and transport refrigeration units, being the first manufacturer to achieve the Carbon Trust’s Energy Technology List certification for cellar cooling equipment as early as 2005.

“The ‘Liquid Air on the Highway’ report states that regulating emissions from TRUs would be a timely and cost-effective way of reducing pollution that causes 29,000 premature deaths in Britain each year.”

The report calculates that using liquid air as a combined motive and refrigerant source could achieve cumulative savings of £76million and a reduction in emissions equivalent to 880,000 tonnes of CO2.

Annual emissions of harmful particulate matter could be cut by 180 tonnes, equivlent to removing 367,000 lorries from service, and nitrogen oxide emissions by more than 1,800 tonnes.