Public Funding for Heat Trace Limited

no public description

To develop new monitoring and control processes that are designed to improve the current manufacturing of existing products and develop novel manufacturing processes for the next generation of electric heating products.

"This is a 12-month feasibility project with 3 partners, Heat Trace Ltd (Lead Partner and SME), Nobel Autoparts UK Ltd (Tier 1 supplier and a Large company) and Warwick Manufacturing Group (RTO) Our vision is the transfer Heat Trace's aluminium-based polymeric smart self-regulating technology into Battery Thermal Management systems. Self-regulating heaters cannot burn out which eliminates thermal runaways. The key objectives are the 1) Development of heating prototypes 2) Incorporation of cooling modules 3) Development of a combined heating/cooling module 4) Development of electrical and fluid connectors 5) Thermal modelling 6) Evaluation of scale up Our approach has 2 steps. In step 1 we replace a state-of-the art EV battery heater with a self-regulating polymer heater. We have estimated that the benefits include better safety, reduced costs and reduced weight of the battery. Step 2 is to replace the state-of-the-art EV cooling module with a CHIP (Cooling and Heating Integrated Pipe). A CHIP module can be either operated as a cooling module or a heating module. We have estimated the benefits and compared them to the 8 Faraday targets. Our analysis shows that the CHIP technology will have significant benefits in 7 of the 8 Faraday targets and in addition will show significant weight reduction of the EV battery. The innovate features include 1) The CHIP module can be operated either as a heating module or a cooling module 2) The self-regulating polymer will minimise variation of surface temperature 3) The aluminium conductors enable flexible geometry, so heater can be customised to any shape, any cell type or module/pack configuration."

To design, develop and embed an advanced software system that will design and monitor total life cycle of installed trace heating systems, for novel applications such as commissioning, planned maintenance and monitoring and control of trace heating systems.

This project will develop, for application in nuclear power and processing, an electrical heating cable which is capable of high temperature withstand and resistance to irradiation. The cable will be a high temperature type built around a novel self-regulating core material suitable for nuclear application. This self-regulating cable, built on new materials offers significant cost reduction and reduced installation time while offering superior safety credentials as the cable cannot burn out, hence making it safer than the current technology. This new material and technology could be utilised in other areas requiring radiation such as long term radiation storage and satellite technologies.

Heat Trace is the technical world leader in the manufacture of self-regulating heating cables, used primarily for heating pipes within the oil/gas market sector. The heating cables comprise two stranded circular copper conductors embedded within a semi-conductive polymeric heating material For this project, the intention is the use of Heat Trace’s base technology to develop prototypes of novel, laminar heating mats, which can be used into targeted markets, thus introducing selfregulating technology for the first time into those markets. The objectives are to develop laminar heating mats providing significant technical benefits, whilst having a lower manufacturing cost than the current state of the art products The major innovative benefit of self-regulating heating technology is that the heater is incapable of overheating or burning out – as its temperature increases, so the heat generated reduces, to a point where the heat output is zero whilst remaining within the maximum withstand temperature of the heater’s constructional materials. Conversely, as the temperature reduces, so the heater produces an increasingly higher power heating load. Such heaters are inherently temperature-safe, and do not require thermostatic control. The major challenge is product cost – the main markets to be addressed involve high volume commodity pricing, where conventional heating cable pricing will be too high. Up to 80% of the cost is in the two copper power conductors. This has been addressed by substituting the expensive copper round wires with flat aluminium foils, thereby reducing the heating element cost by 70%, resulting in very competitive products

To develop and market remote monitoring and control equipment for electrical trace heating products, into the UK and global Nuclear market.

This project will develop, for snow melting and ice prevention of rail switch points, an electric heating system which will require less energy than conventional switch point heaters. This new heating system will be have 4 elements: a self- regulating semi-conductive polymeric heater, an advanced intelligent control system, a thermal insulation system and a dual power supply (mains or solar). Concept testing and thermal heat transfer calculations indicate energy savings of 75% and a 30 to 50% reduction in product life cycle costs. In addition, the new heating system cannot burnout and hence is safer than current technology. This would give Network Rail potential energy cost savings of £9.9 million per year and a carbon footprint reduction of 52,000 tonnes of CO2e per year. This technology could be utilised in other rail heating applications such as heating of the third rail, overhead cables, bridges, tunnels, platforms and under-floor heating.

Awaiting Public Summary

The 5 partners in this project are Heat Trace Ltd, University of Manchester, Innoval Technology, 3M UK and Watlow Ltd. This project has been very successful and showed that 1) Aluminium can replace copper in existing electrical heating products and significantly reduce costs. These products will be more competitive in existing and new markets 2) The use of aluminium has enabled two novel product designs, which are major innovative steps in electrical heating technology. The first is a flexible laminated heater which can be customised to fit around any shape of object to be heated. The second is an integrated heated pipe which will radically change conventional pipe trace heating, giving major savings in the costs of the product, installation and operational energy. Heat Trace has installed a continuous aluminium extruder line for the development and production of these novel aluminium based products. There is a wide range of markets applications including industrial (oil and chemical industries, power stations, rail, automotive, aerospace); commercial (hospitals, schools, offices) and residential (under-floor heating, frost protection and heated hot water pipes)

Awaiting Public Summary