03/28/2025
A field-erected evaporative cooling tower (Image courtesy of EVAPCO).
The 2025 Cooling Technology Institute (CTI) Annual Conference for manufacturers, owner-operators and suppliers of heat rejection equipment was held Feb. 2-5, 2025, at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, TN. This article shares updates to CTI standards and acceptance test codes, synopsizes the event’s educational curriculum, shares perspective and highlights products and services offered by firms at the event’s trade show.
During the luncheon, Jim Baker, President, CTI, shared a history of the CTI to recognize its 75-year anniversary. In 1959, Phillips 66 joined, so participation went beyond cooling tower manufacturers. In 1962, suppliers to the industry became involved. In 1965, the board of directors formed with three-year term limits, still the same as today. In the 1970s, the Summer Meetings began. In 1992, the STD-201 program started. In 1993, the multi-agency testing program began. In 1999, the organization’s name was changed to the Cooling Technology Institute.
“Over the past 20 years, we’ve survived so many hurdles, and are stronger than ever before. Our codes and standards are used worldwide. Our certification is the benchmark in the world,” said Vicky Manser, Administrator, CTI.
Codes and Standards Updates
CTI’s three standing committees – Engineering, Standards & Maintenance (ESM); Performance & Technology (P&T) and Water Treatment (WT) – gather at the event to review, draft and update CTI’s existing and developing acceptance test codes (ATC) and standards (STD) covering thermal performance, sound, drift, materials, plume abatement, vibration, fire resistance and more.
Sound certification (STD-204) is soon going under board approval, targeting 2026, and is only available to companies with thermal certification, according to Baker. It’s often impossible to do a sound test onsite at an installation. Being able to certify sound performance ahead of time brings value to the purchaser and industry, according to Jacob Faulkner, Director of Engineering, Cooling Tower Test Associates. CTI has been working to harmonize international codes and the CTI sound test code before a certification is released so there’s no question about the validity of the calculation, said Scott Nevins, Director of HVAC Product Development, EVAPCO and Chair of P&T.
“A UV study is occurring and we’re approaching a second round of testing laying out a procedure for UV testing of thermoplastic fill materials. UV degrades plastics over time, and standardizing a minimum threshold for the degree of UV resistance is important for the industry,” said Joseph Evans, Senior R&D Engineer, SPX, and Vice Chair, ESM. “In addition, we’re beginning work on STD-137 (Fiberglass Pultruded Structural Products for Use in Cooling Towers), codifying fiberglass design, because the American Society of Civil Engineers just released the load and resistance factor design, extremely important for the field-erected fiberglass industry.”
Lastly, a thermal performance certification program for adiabatic fluid coolers is under development.
Educational Curriculum
The Conference featured around 30 technical paper presentations, the owner/operator session, a water treatment panel discussion, a half-day educational seminar and the longstanding ask-the-expert seminar.
The educational seminar, chaired by Frank Morrison, Technical Director, Global Marketing, Baltimore Aircoil (BAC) and Jared Medlen, Project Manager, Mesa Associates, featured: Fundamentals of Cooling Fan Performance by Sander Venema, Manager Engineering and Production Support, Howden Netherlands; Essential Pump Fundamentals for Optimizing Cooling Tower Performance by Matt Derner, Manager, Education and Energy Efficiency Training Resources, Hydraulic Institute; EHS Considerations for Today’s Cooling Water Treatment by Barbara Keeler, Process Safety Manager, and Felix Dornier, Director of Technical Services, Valero Energy and Heat Rejection for High Density Computing by Steve Kline, Global Technical Director, BAC.
Many technical paper presentations were given by companies exhibiting in the CTI Expo highlighted below. Due to article space constraints, all exhibitors, paper authors and co-authors could not be included.
Heat Rejection Equipment Technology
Aggreko Cooling Tower Services discussed the remote monitoring capabilities of its GT-40 (900-4,000 GPM) and GT-20 Series (400,1,600 GPM) cooling towers. Operators have access to real-time water temperatures, water flow, fan speeds and power consumption, and have the option for Aggreko Remote Monitoring for additional peace of mind.
Gary Hooper, Mike Zaulak, Billy Childers and Travis Whaley of Aggreko Cooling Tower Services (left to right).
Baltimore Aircoil Company (BAC) recently launched its TrilliumSeries Dry Cooler with nominal capacity up to 10,000 MBH (115°F [46°C] EWT, 105°F [41°C] LWT, 95°F [35°C] dry bulb) in five models from 80-160 total horsepower (hp). Nick Mascarenhas, Chief Thermal Engineer, BAC, was recently appointed to the CTI Board of Directors. Frank Morrison, Technical and Marketing Director, BAC, presented a paper along with Bob Cunningham, Principal Consultant, International Water Consultants, titled Environmental Consequences of Evaporative Cooling Restrictions. Incentives are being given to users replacing evaporative systems with alternative technologies. This paper made the following recommendations to the Southern Nevada Water Authority and other jurisdictions that may follow in evaporative cooling restrictions: Reevaluate the ban on all evaporative cooling; recognize the unique considerations in Southern Nevada; clarify the definition of evaporative cooling and conduct evaluations of the energy and water use of water-cooled systems with evaporative heat rejection versus air-cooled and swap cooler systems.
Frank Morrison, Nick Mascarenhas and Steve Kline with BAC (left to right).
Cool Water Technologies, based in Astoria, NY, offers a range of CTI-certified factory assembled cooling towers including counterflow, crossflow and forced draft evaporative models, as well as closed circuit coolers.
Stefan Guetzov with Cool Water Technologies.
Eurovent Certification is recognized as a global leader in third-party performance certification for the HVACR sector. Eurovent has a collaborative arrangement with CTI to use STD-201 for certification compliance.
Jacob Faulkner with Cooling Tower Test Associates, and Ian Butler with Eurovent Certification (left to right).
EvapTech is celebrating its 20-year anniversary. The field-erected cooling tower subsidiary of EVAPCO offers new and replacement FM-approved crossflow and counterflow, and the Meridian Series modular cooling tower. Key features of the FRP-framed Meridian are FM approval options, a pressurized water distribution system, custom fill, high-efficiency drift eliminators (<0.0005%) and maintenance and accessibility options. Its nominal tonnage per cell is rated from 1,427 tons up to 3,597 across the model range.
Bret Calkins with EvapTech.
Mike Partington, Manager – Engineering Parts, SPX Cooling Tech, presented Sound Directivity Index and Influence on Sound Power Calculation. Joseph Evans presented Adiabatic Pre-Cooling Fundamentals and Research, where he offered research comparing once-through media-cooled adiabatic coolers, recirculating media-cooled adiabatic coolers and once-through spray-cooled systems. Topics included hot water delivery rates’ effect on thermal capacity, scale and adiabatic pad life and an overview on saturation efficiency – a ratio of air temperature drop across media.
Kaleigh-Ane Kugel and Gary Stauffer with SPX Cooling Tech (left to right).
Component Suppliers
Brentwood Industries is celebrating its 60-year anniversary. Its team also presented technical papers – Creating an Industry-Wide Fill Performance Test Standard: The Time Has Come by Dylen Ziegler, Application Engineering Manager, Cooling Tower, and Parameter Study of Mechanically Loaded Bottom-Supported Cooling Tower Fill Packs by Angela Zaorski, Lab Supervisor.
Jason Hill with Brentwood Industries.
Galebreaker Industrial discussed its windscreen solutions for cooling towers and air-cooled condensers (ACCs). ACCs are an increasingly popular cooling system in power plants that use air to condense turbine exhaust steam, reducing the need for water. Developing a CTI test code for ACCs is also being revisited, according to Scott Nevins, Director, HVAC Product Development, EVAPCO.
Mark Donoghue, Jamie Wilde, Gary Dicker, Gary Mirsky, Jim Baker, Jeff Ebert, and Brandon Smith at the Galebreaker Industrial booth (left to right).
Robert Ballantyne, RWI Enhanced Evaporation, presented Floating Cooling Tower Auxiliary Heat Rejection. RWI manufactures the Hydracool floating cooling tower, which can be installed floating in ponds at industrial sites.
Sumitomo Drive Technologies displayed the Hansen M5CT vertical right angle 2-stage industrial gearbox series (7 sizes 13-53 kNm). Hansen and Sumitomo merged in 2011. The M5CT is a combination of the best of Sumitomo and Hansen. For example, the gearbox is designed with Sumitomo’s splash lubrication system and the legacy Hansen cooling fin design.
Kris Herijgers and Dan Rosseljong with Sumitomo Drive Technologies (left to right).
TOYOMO Advanced Materials, and its partner Benton International completed the process for CTI FRP Material Certification including flame spread rating in accordance with requirements of CTI Standard STD-13. They’re the first to receive this recognition. “We’re testing for the rate of flame spread, smoke density and toxicity levels. We’re also testing physical failure limits, and we’ve passed all parameters,” said Peter Turnbull, Business Development Director, TOYOMO Advanced Materials.
Aakash Patel and Peter Turnbull of Benton International and TOYOMO Advanced Materials (left to right).
WEG discussed the W23+ Sync synchronous electric motor line meeting ultra-premium (IE5) and higher efficiency levels, cutting losses by more than 40% compared to the IE3 efficiency.
Guilherme Marangoni de Castro of WEG.
CTI is calling for new and young faces to get involved to ensure another 75 years of fulfilling its mission.
“My vision is to begin the training and transition from the old guard to the new. The education and relationships you can build at CTI are priceless,” said Baker.
“Coming from an active board member, I’d like to extend a personal invitation to young process and utility engineers to attend. The unbiased training from the technical papers, and the networking is very valuable,” said Ian Horne, Senior Water Technology Specialist, Air Liquide.
The CTI 2026 Annual Conference and Expo will take place Feb. 8-12, 2026, at the Westin Galleria in Houston, TX.
For more information about the Cooling Technology Institute, visit www.cti.org.
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