Black Forest, Bad Krozingen, Germany
Wednesday, September 25th, 2013 -
Friday, September 27th, 2013
Registration is now possible!
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Chairman's Message
Since the first International Conference on Solar Air Conditioning which took place in 2005 in Bad Staffelstein in Germany, solar cooling technology has faced a lot of changes and evolutions. At this early time, the technology was still in its infancy, mainly driven by R&D institutes and promising a huge potential as an alternative to conventional technology. Since then, conventional energy is still and even more and more expensive and at the same time, solar energy represents the only sustainable and significant renewable way to do air conditioning for buildings.
Now, worldwide, most cooling and refrigeration systems are however still powered by electricity and thermally driven cooling technologies are largely used in combination with waste heat, district heat or co-generation units but not yet widely with solar thermal technology. Over the last decade, about one thousand installations have been realized, mostly in the framework of research and demonstration programs. Some years ago, the start of commercial market development has been observed in the residential sector in Mediterranean countries (e.g. Spain) and in the office building sector in Asia (India, Singapore, China).
Solar cooling technology did not grow up as fast and as massively as expected but the technology is facing a very exciting challenge. Mature components are available and a significant number of reference installations have been realized worldwide. The technology has shown that significant energy savings are possible, and it has reached a level of early market deployment. However, the financial risk for parties involved in solar cooling business is still not clear. More than ever, R&D must be developed on the topic of Solar air conditioning and the 5th International Conference on Solar Air Conditioning in September 2013 will be a unique occasion to show how the crucial battle of Solar cooling to become a bankable technology can be achieved.
For this conference, because Solar air conditioning is stricto sensu Solar energy as the main energy driver to do air conditioning, a brand new topic will be initiated: PV driven solar air conditioning systems. This new topic is related to the direct coupling of photovoltaic and electrically driven chillers/air conditioners. This solar air conditioning application where PV is the main energy driver for cooling was until recently not developed at all because of the quasi systematic grid connection of PV systems. But now that grid parity is becoming a very hot topic in sunny countries and even in all Europe very soon, the 5th International Conference on Solar Air Conditioning had to take into account this new topic which can be considered as a competitor to the traditional Solar cooling technology or in certain case as a complementary technology in other cases.
As a return to the origin after 8 years and Kloster Banz in Bad Staffelstein, the 5th OTTI conference is coming back to Germany and another town in South West area of Baden Württemberg : Bad Krozingen. Close to Freiburg in Breisgau, location of one of the most important R&DF institutes in the World specialized on Solar energy and especially Solar cooling, this town will be an ideal place for speaking about Solar Air Conditioning. Moreover, It will take place just after the 2nd SHC conference which will occur in Freiburg a few days before.
Last but not least, Bad Krozingen is on the threshold of Europe: the border triangle, where Germany, France and Switzerland meet.
Dr. Daniel Mugnier
Tecsol SA
