Ted Perry Award for Student Research

The deadline for nominations and supporting material is the 10th of November.

Nominations procedure

The award is open to postgraduate students undertaking research of a practical nature in a field related to air conditioning or refrigeration. It is designed to encourage interest amongst bright and promising students.

A set of ASHRAE databooks are donated to the winner in memory of Ted Perry, Past President of the IOR, by his wife Barbara Perry.

The prize includes an engraved trophy, a set of ASHRAE Databooks and a cheque for £1000.00. The winner will be presented with the award at the IOR Annual Dinner being held in February. Past winners have covered topics as diverse as the use of the heat sink effect to cool underground tunnels, cryogenic freezing, domestic refrigerator design, and solar-powered refrigeration.

The nominations will require

A nomination and recommendation for the supervising tutor

The student will need to supply

A summary of their research
A statement of no more than 650 words explaining “why this research is signposting the future for the RACHP sector”
Any additional supporting material for consideration
A digital image of themselves to be used in connection with the award if necessary

A three minutes thesis event will form part of the judging process:

The shortlisted nominees will be required to take part in a three-minute thesis event that will be will take place in either January or February. This will be an online event with an audience.

2022/2023 Winner

Elias Eid, London South Bank University

"Reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions from the retail sector in Europe"

Elias has been working on novel, but practical work to understand how supermarket systems across Europe can decarbonise to reach net zero targets. He has been involved in all aspects of the work from initially independently reviewing the available technologies and strategies, to identifying the most promising opportunities and then modelling typical supermarket systems to understand the overall system carbon emissions savings that can be achieved in different European countries. His work was described by the judges as “research that could make an immediate impact on the retail industry, resulting in significant savings over the coming five to ten years through some simple steps that are available now."

Elias Eid will present a paper to IOR members as part of the 2024-2025 Tech Talk programme.

Past Winners

2021/2022 Henrique Lagoeiro, London South Bank University. "Waste heat from the London Underground: an investigation of the potential benefits of integrating heating and cooling". The judges described this work as “original with high potential impact” something that could be “rolled out worldwide and adapted to different applications from data centre cooling to district heating”.
2020/2021 Nausheen Basha of City, University London. "Development of Screw Compressor by Improving Oil Injection System". This research involved improving cooling and oil distribution within an oil-injected screw compressor The judges commented: “This research will have an immediate effect, that could have a global impact and is ready to be applied now.”
2019/2020 Qi Xu of the University of Nottingham for her work developing an innovative heat pump, “the EcoPump“. This low-energy HVAC system is a novel and exciting project that could have a far-reaching and significant impact on the domestic mass market for air conditioning.
2018/2019 Eman Hussein of the University of Birmingham for her work developing advanced metal-organic framework materials with high water adsorption capacity. The research included both the theoretical assessment of these materials and the practical development of the adsorption heat pump. Eman investigated integrating the new advanced material using coating techniques and evaluated the performance of such coatings through measuring their water adsorption uptake and the mechanical strength.

2017/2018 Christina Francis of London South Bank University for her research project that delivered a comprehensive study into the direct and indirect impact of carbon emissions from refrigerated transport systems.
2016/2017 Chris Druce of London South Bank University for his research project investigated the impact of refrigerant leakage on the performance of systems comparing various refrigerants including HFO blends.
2015/16 Thorsten Spillmann "Cost-effective solar-powered air conditioning using desiccant coated heat exchangers" (University of Warwick)
2014/15 Angeles Rivero-Pacho "Thermodynamic and heat transfer analysis of a carbon – ammonia adsorption heat pump” (University of Warwick)
2013/14 Goran Micic Novel "Development of a freezer operating at -150 degrees" (London South Bank University)
2012/13 Anna Catarina Marques "Novel design and performance enhancement of domestic refrigerators with thermal storage" (London South Bank University)
2011/12 Ahmed Alsayed "Heat transfer inside helically coiled small diameter tubes for miniature cooling systems" (University of Birmingham)
20010/11 Shane Smyth "Multi-temperature control of transport refrigeration using secondary refrigeration systems" (University College Dublin)
2009/10 Ina Colombo “Carbon dioxide with heat recovery for supermarkets” (LSBU)
2008/2009 Dr Dereje Shiferaw “Flow Boiling of Refrigerants in Small to Micro Diameter Metallic Tubes” (Brunel University)
2006/7 Dr Alex Mischenko "Giant electrocaloric effect in thin films" (Cambridge University)
2007/8 Dr Jolyon Thompson "Sustainable Cooling of Underground Railways through Enhancement of the Heat Sink Effect", (London South Bank University)
2005/6 Mr A Campbell "The use of natural refrigerants in supermarkets" (London South Bank University)
2004/5 Mr R Kemp "Development of an Ejector Hybrid Air Conditioning System Using Carbon Dioxide" (University of Nottingham)
2003/4 Dr Yu Yan "Performance optimisation of HFC refrigerants by experimental and mathematical models" (University of Strathclyde)
2002/3 Mr E Hammond "Reducing the ozone depleting potential and improving the efficiency of domestic refrigerators" (University of Bath and Food Refrigeration and Process Engineering Research Centre, University of Bristol)
2001/2 Mr Chris Martin BSc "The freezing of non-metallic pipelines" (Southampton University)
2000/1 Dr Shenyi Wu "The development of an Advanced Thermally Powered Refrigeration Cycle" (University of Nottingham)
1999/2000 Dr X Boissieux "Heat Transfer Coefficients and Friction Factors for Non-Ozone Depleting Refrigerants and Oil Mixtures" (University of Brighton)
1998/9 Dr A Lamb "The Use of Wide Boiling Refrigerant Mixtures for Power Saving in Water Chillers" (Leeds University)
1997/8 Mr Abu Madi BSc "The Performance of Non-Ozone Depleting Refrigerants in Condensors and Evaporators, The Effect of Refrigerant Properties on the Design of Automotive Air Conditioning Systems and Performance Characteristics Correlation for Round Tube and Plate finned Heat Exchangers". (University of Brighton)
1996/7 Miss T Thomas "Design and Development of a Solar Powered Portable Refrigerator for preserving vaccines" (Swansea Institute of Higher Education)
1995/6 Dr A Bensafi "Research in the Field of Mixed Refrigerants" (Leeds University)
1994/5 Mr D Bostock "Carbon Dioxide as a Secondary Refrigerant" (Strathclyde University)
1994/5 Mssrs A Douglas, M Lewis, M Watson and R Fawcett "Development of a High Performance Refrigerator" (University of Bristol, FR&PERC).
1993/4 Mr L Nagle "The Development of a Self-Contained Refrigerated Back-Pack for Vaccine Transportation" (Cranfield Institute of Technology)
1992/3 JB McCafferty "Refrigerant Distribution in Evaporators" (Herriot Watt University, Edinburgh)
1991/2 Dr RN Richardson "Developing a Pulse-Tube Refrigerator" (Southampton University, Institute of Cryogenics).

Award Rules and Nominations procedure

This Award was set up by the Institute of Refrigeration after the death of Ted Perry, a lifetime worker in the field of refrigeration and a past President of the Institute with a legacy from his wife Barbara Perry.

Ted always found great enjoyment in coaching young engineers in excellence in refrigeration and general engineering practice.

The aim of the Award is to encourage young engineers to investigate the special and diverse skills required in refrigeration with the hope of encouraging them to enter the field professionally.

The Award is open to anyone submitting a piece of work on an engineering topic related to refrigeration and undertaken as part of a degree course or doctorate. Other pieces of work will also be considered although it is envisaged that persons over the age of 35 are less likely to be successful.

Ted was always a practical man who enjoyed new challenges and had little time for those people who insisted on narrow thinking. Accordingly, the judges are looking particularly for the demonstration of the understanding of the problems that they are addressing in their work, for technical flair, and for practical applicability. Work that addresses immediate problems are likely to be given higher consideration than work that is less directly applicable now.

The prize is a cheque for £1000, an engraved tankard and a set of ASHRAE databooks donated by Ted's family.

The winner is invited to attend the Annual Dinner of the Institute in February in London, all expenses paid including hotel accommodation, for the prize giving. Depending on the nature of the winning piece of work, the entrant may be asked to prepare and present a paper for the Institute's Proceedings. Entries can be received at any time of the year, although in general only those received before mid-November can be assured of being assessed for the following February.