Reduce your fridge energy running costs

Did you know that 1/3 of the world's electricity is consumed in the word's fridges and freezers keeping our food fresh, either storing it in the kitchen or transporting it from the farm gate to our dinner plate?

How do you make a fridge more energy efficient?

There are only 3 things to worry about inside your average fridge:

1. Fridge Temperature


2. Relative Humidity


3. Gaseous atmosphere

For the purpose of this article, we are going to discuss the first two as they are directly related to each other and the use of energy. If you start from the understanding that moisture - laden air is more expensive to heat up or cool down you will then begin to understand why keeping the fridge cool but at the right humidity is so important to save energy. The only thing wrong with the average walk-in fridge in your typical restaurant kitchen is you have to open the door in order to put your food in or take it out. Now of course when you open the door, you let cold air out and warmer air in and this creates excess moisture. The longer the door is open and the more trips in and out of the fridge you make the more humidity you create inside the fridge.

So what happens when the fridge gets too humid? Well of course the air inside gets warmer and therefore the compressor has to work a lot more hours than it should have to trying to cool the air back down again. In addition when you get a lot of excess moisture you invariably get a build up of ice on the evaporator which reduces the capacity of the fridge to blow out cold air and drastically reduces the efficiency of the fridge.

This set of circumstances creates an extra energy burden by having to introduce more defrost cycles than is needed. The defrost cycle in itself uses a lot of energy trying to melt the ice but often it is a just vicious circle of energy wastage. What happens is the defrost heater comes on, melts the ice from the evaporator and turns it into water again. Of course when the compressor come on to cool down the fridge after the defrost heater has done its work the evaporator fans blows this moisture back up against the cold evaporator forming ice once again. Not until all the excess moisture is taken out of the fridge will this process stop repeating itself wasting tons of precious energy.

Humico and Humitech biosmart filters prevent excess humidity from building up inside the fridge by absorbing this excess moisture when it enters the fridge and therefore keeps the fridge cooler and at a more constant temperature throughout the day. Remember when the humidity goes up or down inside the fridge so does the temperature and fluctuations in temperature affect food safety and food shelf life.

When Humico biosmart filters are fitted in your average walk in fridge they will reduce compressor run times by up to 4 hours a day. They will also reduce defrost cycle times by up to 60% and improve fridge recovery time by more than 50%.

In over 10,000 weeks of testing Biosmart filters have proven themselves capable of a combined energy saving of 35% on the running costs of a typical walk-in fridge. More information about how to save on fridge maintenance can be found on Humico Biosmart website.