Feature story - October 6, 2006
SolarChill is a new climate-friendly refrigeration technology using solar power, enabling delivery of vaccines and food to regions of the world without electricity. Developed by us along with six other organisations it has won the Environmental Pioneer in Refrigeration award in the 2006 Cooling Industry Awards.
SolarChill prototypes - the vaccine cooler and the refrigerator.
The SolarChill project developed a versatile refrigeration
technologythat operates on solar energy; uses environmentally safe
refrigerants;bypasses the use of lead batteries; and can also be
plugged into theelectricity grid. Developed over the last six
years, SolarChill has been fieldtested in Senegal, Indonesia, and
Cuba and once it receives WorldHealth Organisation (WHO) approval
will be deployed across the world.
"The Solar Chill technology clearly demonstrates the huge,
largelyuntapped resource of clean, renewable solar power that's out
there.This innovation will improve the delivery of vaccine
programmes in manyregions of the world and save countless lives,"
said Wolfgang Lohbeckof Greenpeace Germany.
SolarChill could replace the 100,000 kerosenerefrigerators in
use today around the world for cooling vaccines.Kerosene
refrigerators are often unreliable and produce approximatelybetween
73 and 91 million kilograms of CO2 each year.
Developed along with UNICEF, UNEP, World Health Organisation
(WHO), GTZProklima, Programmes for Appropriate Technologies in
Health (PATH) andthe Danish Technological Institute, SolarChill
will improve both humanhealth care and help fight global
warming.
More about SolarChill
At the same
awards ceremony Coca-Cola also received an award forequipping
all World Cup stadiums in Germany with refrigerationtechnology that
doesn't use powerful global warming gases and it moreenergy
efficient. This is another positive result of our
successfulcampaign to make Coke switch to more environmentally
friendlyrefrigeration technology.
More about
Coke's switch to climate friendly refrigeration
.
All in all a nice night for us, but a even better night for
recognising technology that is good for the planet.
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