Convertible Refrigerated Warehouse Buildings.
Refrigerated storage space within an industrial warehouse building is always defined by the limits of its’ temperature capabilities. All warehouse space in refrigerated buildings with temperature capabilities of a plus 65° Fahrenheit down to a minus 20° Fahrenheit is by definition defined as refrigerated warehouse space.
However a question often asked in refrigerated real estate brokerage of freezer warehouse or cooler warehouse space is an understanding of what the temperature range capacity is of the refrigerated warehouse storage space that is temperature controlled. Different refrigerated food products have different temperature storage specification requirements. Most companies offer many different refrigerated food products and therefore have multiple refrigerated storage temperature needs inside of one refrigerated warehouse building.
When understanding whether or not a freezer or cooler warehouse building is capable of maintaining a certain temperature, 3 aspects of the construction of freezer or cooler warehouse building that have to be considered. Those aspects are the warehouse floor, the installation within the walls and the ceiling and the type of refrigeration system.
The refrigerated warehouse floor will either contain an in-floor heating/defrosting system or it does not have defrosting capabilities .If the building was designed exclusively for freezer warehouse storage, it will have an heating system underneath the warehouse floor. These heating/defrosting systems are of various types, but it is designed to not let the moisture in the ground below the refrigerated warehouse floor to freeze. Whatever water freezes, it expands and that expansion of water below the refrigerated warehouse floor will cause the floor to heave upwards and possibly even result in making a structurally unstable warehouse building.
If the building was initially designed for any refrigerated food processing operations, underneath the food processing building’s production floor areas there will be floor drains. Also, there will be various water pipes for processing and cleanup of foods manufacturing operations. The floor drains will conduct the cold to where the pipes may run causing freezing problems anywhere in the building. Occasionally the property surrounding that building will eventually freeze all the way to the sanitary sewer system. Then of course all water pipes within the production floor area freeze when it gets colder than 32° Fahrenheit. This type of building can never be used for the storage of product requiring freezer warehouse storage temperatures. To do so cause damage to the facility due to the expansion caused by unprotected freezing. The refrigeration systems were designed for temperatures higher than 32° Fahrenheit, so to operate those below that, would cause the refrigeration system to eventually freeze up with ice. Also ice would form under the floor and the floors would heave at some point time.
Some industrial warehouse facilities are designed to provide storage temperatures only for a plus 40°F to a plus 65°F. The installation thickness and efficiencies for the insulated walls and ceiling required to operate at these refrigerated temperatures are less efficient than those required to operate at freezer storage temperatures less than 32°.
Refrigerated storage space within an industrial warehouse building is always defined by the limits of its’ temperature capabilities. All warehouse space in refrigerated buildings with temperature capabilities of a plus 65° Fahrenheit down to a minus 20° Fahrenheit is by definition defined as refrigerated warehouse space.
However a question often asked in refrigerated real estate brokerage of freezer warehouse or cooler warehouse space is an understanding of what the temperature range capacity is of the refrigerated warehouse storage space that is temperature controlled. Different refrigerated food products have different temperature storage specification requirements. Most companies offer many different refrigerated food products and therefore have multiple refrigerated storage temperature needs inside of one refrigerated warehouse building.
When understanding whether or not a freezer or cooler warehouse building is capable of maintaining a certain temperature, 3 aspects of the construction of freezer or cooler warehouse building that have to be considered. Those aspects are the warehouse floor, the installation within the walls and the ceiling and the type of refrigeration system.
The refrigerated warehouse floor will either contain an in-floor heating/defrosting system or it does not have defrosting capabilities .If the building was designed exclusively for freezer warehouse storage, it will have an heating system underneath the warehouse floor. These heating/defrosting systems are of various types, but it is designed to not let the moisture in the ground below the refrigerated warehouse floor to freeze. Whatever water freezes, it expands and that expansion of water below the refrigerated warehouse floor will cause the floor to heave upwards and possibly even result in making a structurally unstable warehouse building.
If the building was initially designed for any refrigerated food processing operations, underneath the food processing building’s production floor areas there will be floor drains. Also, there will be various water pipes for processing and cleanup of foods manufacturing operations. The floor drains will conduct the cold to where the pipes may run causing freezing problems anywhere in the building. Occasionally the property surrounding that building will eventually freeze all the way to the sanitary sewer system. Then of course all water pipes within the production floor area freeze when it gets colder than 32° Fahrenheit. This type of building can never be used for the storage of product requiring freezer warehouse storage temperatures. To do so cause damage to the facility due to the expansion caused by unprotected freezing. The refrigeration systems were designed for temperatures higher than 32° Fahrenheit, so to operate those below that, would cause the refrigeration system to eventually freeze up with ice. Also ice would form under the floor and the floors would heave at some point time.
Some industrial warehouse facilities are designed to provide storage temperatures only for a plus 40°F to a plus 65°F. The installation thickness and efficiencies for the insulated walls and ceiling required to operate at these refrigerated temperatures are less efficient than those required to operate at freezer storage temperatures less than 32°.
The refrigeration systems that are designed to operate in above freezing conditions have no defrosting mechanisms. Therefore if a cooler building was brought to below freezing temperatures, eventually the warehouse floors would buckle and heave, the refrigeration systems which freeze up with ice and until both of those happened, the energy consumption would be abnormally high.
However if you purchase or lease in industrial warehouse facility with freezer warehouse space, you can always store product in that building that requires less than 32° storage temperatures. If you wish to have temperatures between 40° and 65°F then all that will be needed is to change the refrigeration system to a different type of gas and pressures within that system and other various minor modifications to the evaporators. The floors will not heave upwards because there are is no underground moisture freezing going on to cause expansion. The wall and ceiling insulation will also be more than efficient. This is what is referred to as Convertible Warehouse Space.
As the saying goes in the refrigerated building real estate brokerage industry, "You can always make a freezer building a cooler building, but you can never make a cooler building a freezer building".
Hawk Distribution Services provides real estate brokerage services for refrigerated buildings. Information about refrigerated buildings available for sale or lease is available at http://www.hawkds.com/ or contact Jim Cronin at 314-994-0577 or j.cronin@hawkds.com
Jim Cronin, Broker
Phil Pisciotta, Agent - Kansas City Operations
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