Coffee Break

In the last few months, 5G related hoax stories have appeared with alarming regularity. One of the contributing factors in their spread has been the quarantine imposed due to the Covid-19 epidemic.

Custom software is any program created on an ad hoc basis to meet a client’s specific needs. In business, many companies use this kind of software, especially if they require specific functionalities which are not yet widely available.

Software developers propose very different licensing alternatives. In recent years the industry has been affected by numerous changes and a strong influence from Cloud Computing, which introduced the concept of “Software as a Service” (SaaS).

The 2020 F-GAS regulations have brought in even tighter restrictions on the use of fluorinated gases, with the dual purposes of reducing emissions of atmospheric pollutants and combatting the greenhouse effect. This legislation was first introduced in 2014 with the aim of reducing hydrocarbon emissions by 80% by the year 2030.

The process of Italy’s digital transformation has been accelerated by the lockdown. The public’s knowledge of IT technology was already quite good, but many people have only discovered its true potential as a result of the exceptional circumstances caused by the recent Covid-19 pandemic.

The phase-out of HFC’s (Freon or Hydrofluorocarbons) is a measure designed to gradually reduce the impact of refrigerants on the atmosphere’s ozone layer. These substances are widely used in the HVAC sector, but also in domestic and industrial refrigeration (fridges, freezers etc.).

The decision to use R32 as the refrigerant gas in future air conditioning systems has become an ongoing, controversial debate. Some producers have embraced the switch to this gas, which has a very low GWP (Global Warming Potential), while others continue to delay this change which now seems inevitable.

The new refrigerant cylinders will be gray. This is the decision of AHRI, which had previously defined a colour coding for hydrofluorocarbon containers, used until a few months ago by many manufacturers.

The IIoT (Industrial Internet of Things) is a special subcategory of the Internet of Things (IoT), used in the industrial sector. It involves equipment and analysis platforms which are connected to the internet, environmental sensors, complex industrial robots and much more.

Although less severe than the impact on other sectors, the impact of the coronavirus on the HVAC sector in the EU and USA has become apparent. There have been slowdowns, losses and unexpected issues, but just about every country has managed to find a strategy to limit the damage caused by Covid-19.

Covid’s impact on the environment seems to have had both positive and negative effects: on the one hand, the lockdown brought a temporary cease in the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere (especially in large industrialised cities), while, on the other hand, it provided some sectors with a chance to try and get around restrictions set out in pollution legislation.

In this article, in a very simplified way, we see what is meant by free cooling, and how it can be a valid alternative, convenient under the right conditions.Free cooling is a special cooling method which uses external temperatures to dissipate the heat inside a closed system. It is a very efficient solution which, if used in the right environments, can result in considerable savings.