ICR2007 in Beijing

The International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR) holds Congresses every 4 years. They have two objectives: - a scientific objective: apart from the numerous IIR and IIR-co-sponsored conferences (about 50 over a 4-year period), which are focused on certain themes, the Congress brings together all themes on all refrigeration technologies, thus allowing many new contacts to be set up and ideas to be put forward; - a statutory objective: all the Presidents of commissions, the Heads of sections, the Presidents of the Science and Technology Council, the Executive and the Management Committees, the General Conference, are elected for a 4-year mandate on that occasion. Decisions regarding budgets and strategic issues are also adopted. The 22nd IIR International Congress of Refrigeration (ICR2007) held in Beijing on August 21-26, 2007, was a great success: 1308 participants from 55 countries attended this key event during which 876 papers on all refrigeration technologies and applications were presented. Eleven technical tours, 5 short courses and a rich programme enabling participants to visit Beijing and the surrounding regions were also arranged. The themes that attracted the most interest during this congress with an apt overarching theme, Refrigeration Creates the Future, were the following: - new developments in natural refrigerants, with a focus on CO2 (new components for CO2 systems, use in cascade or transcritical cycles or as a secondary refrigerant, etc.): see the "Technology" section; - enhancement of the energy efficiency of refrigeration systems (new developments in compressors, optimization of heat transfer, mini- and micro-channel exchangers, phase-change materials, etc.); - new trends in air conditioning (indoor air quality, thermal comfort, etc.), heat pumps, absorption and adsorption technologies, cryogenics, gas liquefaction and separation. The congress proceedings containing all the papers presented are on sale: www.iifiir.org or iif-iir@iifiir.org The new Presidents elected are: - Prof. Henk van der Ree (The Netherlands), President of the General Conference; - Prof. Joachim Paul (Denmark), President of the Executive and Management Committees; - Dr David Tanner (New Zealand), President of the Science and Technology Council. The IIR ran a stand during the Congress. It provided an opportunity to launch the International Dictionary of Refrigeration. You can now order the English-French version (see below). The preparation of the new Dictionary in 11 languages has involved a huge amount of work and will be an extremely valuable tool! Légende des photos: The opening ceremony An amazing acrobatic show