Introduction

Artificial hockey and skating ice surfaces are currently created with a refrigeration system. This makes it possible to keep the ice in place for extended periods of time, which in turn can lead to extended ground freezing beneath the ice surface. To prevent the ground freezing, the ice surface is often constructed on top of insulation.

In this illustrative example, the objective is to demonstrate the effect of the refrigeration system on an underlying soil region if this insulation is not present. The primary purpose of the example is to illustrate the steps and procedures required for a heat transfer analysis with phase change using TEMP/W. The soil properties and boundary conditions have been selected for illustrative purposes only.