With a population of over 15 million and its strategic geographic location, Senegal is considered the gateway to West Africa. The country has finally realized its long-awaited goal of opening a new international airport. The Dakar Blaise Diagne International Airport, constructed by Limak and Summa—two of Turkey’s and the world’s leading infrastructure and construction companies—features Airwell rooftop units supplied under the distributorship of Atlantik Grup.
Limak and Summa will jointly operate the airport for 25 years. The airport’s passenger capacity, which was 2 million in 2015, is planned to be increased to 5 million.
The project includes a total of 8 Airwell rooftop units—3 with mixed air and 5 with 100% fresh air—providing a combined cooling capacity of 625 kW.
Thanks to integrated air quality sensors, Airwell packaged rooftop units can automatically adjust the proportion of fresh air based on occupancy, helping to avoid unnecessary fresh air intake and thus achieve significant energy savings. The free cooling feature, standard in all packaged rooftop units, enables 100% outdoor air cooling during transitional seasons when outdoor temperatures are low.
Due to the requirement that rooftop units must operate with 100% fresh air under 42°C outdoor temperature and 42% relative humidity, specially designed Airwell rooftop units were chosen for the project.
As outdoor temperature and humidity levels increase, operating rooftop units with 100% fresh air becomes more challenging. To address this, dual-row evaporators were used in the 100% fresh air models for this project. Since winter temperatures in Dakar, Senegal, rarely drop below 19°C even under the worst conditions, the units are designed to operate in cooling mode only.
All rooftop units in the project are connected to the building automation system via MODBUS interface cards, enabling centralized control and monitoring.
The high efficiency of the Airwell units and their ability to meet the strict performance specifications were key factors in their selection for this project.
With the motto “The Address of Efficient Systems,” Atlantik Grup prioritizes energy efficiency in every project. In an era where energy resources are diminishing and energy costs are rising, the importance of focusing on efficient systems has once again become clear.