6. Environment >
6.7 Thermoacoustic Refrigeration
Sounds Cool!
Thermoacoustic Refrigeration (TAR) is an alternative refrigeration technology that utilizes sound waves to create cooling, as opposed to the traditional means of mechanical refrigeration reliant on the compression and expansion of speci
alized gases. Since there are more than 1.8 million ice cream cabinets in use worldwide, TAR has the potential to eliminate a significant amount of environmentally harmful and flammable gases from the process of mechanical refrigeration.
In 1999, Ben & Jerry’s first teamed up with Acoustics Professor Steven Garrett and fellow researchers at Penn State’s Applied Research Laboratory, where we helped fund a project to develop an environmentally-friendly, compact freezer cabinet that uses thermoacoustic technology.
In 2002, Ben & Jerry’s and Unilever Research partnered to fund a second round of research on TAR at Penn State University.
At the 2004 Earth Day Celebration in New York City, Penn State researchers and Ben & Jerry’s successfully debuted the first working ice cream cabinet powered by a thermoacoustic engine. The engine was functionally integrated into a standard ice cream cabinet and demonstrated in use, cooling ice cream for two public events. Both of these initial presentations showed that ice cream could be cooled to practical operating temperatures (-20° C) and could overcome typical field conditions (125 W of cooling power) using a thermoacoustically-powered device. The operating prototype and related research was also presented at the Refrigerants, Naturally Conference in Brussels, 
Belgium, on June 22, 2004. This conference, co-sponsored by the United Nations Environmental Program, Greenpeace, Unilever, Coca-Cola and McDonalds, is a forum dedicated to exploring and presenting the latest developments in mechanical refrigeration that do not rely on environmentally-harmful gases such as HFCs and CFCs.
At Ben & Jerry’s we launched a fun, animated presentation called “Sounds Cool,” on our website, which includes information about the environmental dangers of common refrigerants; the options that thermoacoustics and alternative technologies offer; and links to additional information. Watch the presentation.
Our funded research on TAR ended in 2004 with the completion of the prototype. Still, Ben & Jerry’s intends to find new ways to support this developing technology by exploring options for beta testing of early commercial units.
In 2004, Penn State negotiated the sale of intellectual property rights to the newly founded Thermoacoustics Corporation (TAC). Penn State researchers also secured two additional years of venture capital funding from the TAC to continue research into commercial application of the technology.
In 2005, Thermoacoustic Corporation (TAC) shifted its focus from ice cream cabinet applications to other classes of cooling equipment in collaboration with a third party joint development partner. This initiative, while not targeted toward a device that Ben & Jerry’s might immediately use in its distribution system, is very promising in that it may lead to establishing the commercial viability of this emerging, environmentally superior technology for use in other mechanical cooling applications. Ben & Jerry’s was not under contract with Penn State or TAC for research in 2006. Ben & Jerry’s Research and Development department continues to stay in close contact with TAC and has offered assistance with providing potential test applications of the emerging devices, if applicable.