Heineken® wanted to leverage the launch of its Greener Bar – fully sustainable event bar that was 100% recyclable – to develop new technologies that helped to address environmental challenges within the mobile bar space. One of the main issues faced is in mobile refrigeration – with most solutions requiring substantial generators to power and chill beers at large scale events.

Digging into the challenges that come with mobile refrigeration, we identified that if we leveraged the ancient physical principles of kinetic energy, we would be able to develop a machine that both cold a beer but in a fun and efficient way.

£45,000 Construction

£40,000 Creative

Chill Station was developed for Heineken® as part of an exploration for innovative ways to reduce their carbon footprint and make their event-based bars more sustainable.

Forced convection cooling

To create a whirlpool strong enough to chill the beer quickly, you need lots of speed. The Chill Station is powered by you and a hand crank lever which connects to a plexitube filled with chilled water. A beer bottle is dropped in the top using a propeller-like attachment, which spins as it sinks to the bottom. To bring the bottle to the surface again, you now turn the lever really quickly creating a whirlpool in the tube, forcing the bottle to spin ever faster as it slowly rises to the top. An experiential demonstration of forced convection cooling –and kinetic energy. Thanks to your hard work, a nice cold beer is served at an optimal 5 Degrees.

We have found that people are more than willing to donate kinetic energy to chilling their beer, especially if that means some reduction of the bar’s carbon footprint.

So far event attendees have donated over 5 KwH in kinetic energy which could power 8 beer fridges at an event. Cooling end enjoying 600 beers!

This version (and the prototype) of The Chill Station have been proof-of-concepts, and more focused on changing user behaviour at this stage.

We hope to further develop the concept and integrate gamification methods such as top lists and rewards and thereby encourage greater engagement.

The Chill Station consists of 3 separate, plexitubes of chilled water, one on each side of the structure. Each tube is connected to a hand-crank lever

Forced convection cooling takes place when liquids spin “inside” of each other, the key factor is spinning the bottle along its axis when submerged.

First the user places a bottle into a 3D-printed holder that floats on the top of the tube. The weight of the bottle forces it to sink - and since the holder is fitted with screw-threads it rotates all the way to the bottom.

Next, we cool the liquid by pushing the bottle back up to the top – whilst it spins.

The hand-crank lever runs a pump that creates a whirlpool in the tube, effectively spinning the bottle through the threads which also, slowly, forces the bottle to the surface.

The process is designed to take 3-4 minutes – which decreases the temperature with 15-20 °C.

The main energy saving is made due to the kinetic energy provided by the user. The faster they turn the lever the more kinetic energy drives the process and cools the beer more effectively with a faster whirlpool of cold water.