Mitigating wine shelves above wine fridge

I'm finishing my basement, and the only space I have for wine will be a 3 foot wide nook where I can put shelving etc. to meet my needs. Bonus is that it'll be 9 feet high.

I'm currently considering putting a small wine fridge at the bottom of the nook, with a counter over top to place bottles, glasses etc temporarily when playing around down there. Above that I was figuring on doing open shelving to the ceiling for the rest of my bottles.

My GC has raised the issue of heat from the wine fridge impacting the bottles on the shelves above it. I'm just wondering how much I should be concerned? I'm assuming I would use a wine fridge intended for built-in use to front vent, but perhaps that wouldn't be enough. If I can do a small fridge that is capable of structured venting, I can vent out the side wall to the utility room (I'm insulating the wall between the utility room and the wine closet) and could further vent away from the closet if needed.

Unless there's a better way to approach this. Thoughts?

Paul

I would say that your contractor has given you something to consider. A little more information would be helpful. Is the basement completely below grade or do you have a "walk out" side or sides? What it the ambient temperature in your basement? Mine is unfinished and stays in the 60-70 degree F range all year. Where do you live? I would be concerned about the "nook" design because it would be essentially a shaft and warm air would rise and be trapped at the top. The vent from the fridge could contribute to this.

You will find that the space you've been allotted will be nowhere near enough. Bottles and glassware up that high is inviting trouble! And the extra warmth is not optimal for wine storage.

For my purposes I think there will be plenty of shelf space for me, I'm not concerned about that. What I'm trying to figure out is how I can mitigate the warmth. I'm not saying "there will be warmth up there, is the warmth ok"?. I'm saying "will there be warmth up there that I can't mitigate"? I'm hoping that I can insulate below the counter and/or vent the fridge such that there won't be enough warmth going up to be an issue...

Well let me ask,,,,, How long do you plan on that stock being up there??? If you can consume it say within a year it shouldn't suffer any ill effects provided it has been prepared properly. 9' up can be a lot different than floor level!!

If you go with a wine fridge that does not use a compressor (peltier) to cool then you won't have any heat issues at all.

Not long term stock up there, but there could be medium term stock, I figure probably over 50% would be less than a year, but the rest perhaps a couple. The 'special' long term bottles will go in the cooler. If I can indeed get a fridge that doesnt' use a compressor then I'd be in business for sure....

ibglowin said:

If you go with a wine fridge that does not use a compressor (peltier) to cool then you won't have any heat issues at all.

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Is that actually true? I thought Peltier coolers were not (yet?) as efficient as compressors?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoelectric_cooling

The primary advantages of a Peltier cooler compared to a vapor-compression refrigerator are its lack of moving parts or circulating liquid, very long life, invulnerability to leaks, small size and flexible shape. Its main disadvantage is high cost and poor power efficiency. (Emphasis added.)

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(I hope it goes without saying that 100% of the electrical energy consumed by either of the two devices winds up as waste heat.)

Only 3 feet wide??? Priorities man, priorities!

Even if you have no heat issues, another thing to consider is if there is any vibration. This could inhibit the settling of any sediment that occurs over time. I would consider moving the wine fridge to, say, beneath a bookshelf.

There you go Paul trying to be a party pooper with of all things SCIENCE…….

No they don't work (cool as well) as a compressor but they have no moving parts, are silent (for the most part) and put out less heat than any compressor based fridge.

If heat is an issue this would put out less than any compressor. They have a limited cooling range not due to Chemistry but your gosh darned Physics, so could you like fix this please or do us Chemist have to solve all the worlds problems….. LOL!

sour_grapes said:

Is that actually true? I thought Peltier coolers were not (yet?) as efficient as compressors?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoelectric_cooling



(I hope it goes without saying that 100% of the electrical energy consumed by either of the two devices winds up as waste heat.)

Click to expand...

ibglowin said:

No they don't work (cool as well) as a compressor but they have no moving parts, are silent (for the most part) and put out less heat than any compressor based fridge.

If heat is an issue this would put out less than any compressor.

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Mike, I tried to alert you to this possible fallacy in the original message. Your assertions are not internally consistent.

What does "not cool as well" mean to you? Does it not mean "not as efficient"? Efficiency measures the cooling performance (which I'll quantify if you like) per unit energy consumed. In other words, for a given amount of cooling, Peltier systems consume MORE energy than compressor-based systems.

Where do you think this energy goes? In both cases, it turns into waste heat. (Compressors also produce noise and vibrations, but these will also devolve to heat eventually.) So, in other words, for a given amount of cooling, a Peltier system must produce more waste heat than a compressor-based system.

It may be desirable to have less noise and vibrations, but the OP is concerned about heat.

If you are still having trouble visualizing this, imagine a cardboard box, and you don't know what is inside of it. All you know is that a power cord runs into it, and it draws a certain electrical current with a certain voltage drop. Clearly, work is being done by the outside world on the contents of the box. Unless you are storing energy somehow inside the box, this work will turn into heat. The more the current is, the more heat produced. No way around this.

Not cool as well means:

A compressor based fridge can cool down to ~35F.

A Peltier based fridge can cool down to ~50F


A Peltier based fridge needs to be indoors in a controlled environment. They don't work well (efficiently) above 80F or below 50F


I never said a Peltier fridge didn't put out any heat, I said they put out less heat than a compressor based model.

A small Peltier wine fridge has about a one inch square "heat pump" with a large heat sink and a fan to disperse the heat.

The OP would need a specially designed fridge if it is to be a "built in" to disperse heat be it a compressor based model or a thermoelectric based model.

ibglowin said:

I never said a Peltier fridge didn't put out any heat, I said they put out less heat than a compressor based model.

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But I don't think this is true. Under the best conditions, Peltier coolers have a COP (coefficient of performance) of about 0.4 to 0.7 (according to a manufacturer). R-134A based fridges have a COP of about 2 to 3. As you note, these numbers depend on the temperature, but they are worse for Peltier systems even in the sweet spot you refer to.

Trust me its true Paul. Its all right here……

ibglowin said:

Trust me its true Paul. Its all right here……

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I believe that was a tacit concession of my point. Glad I could help.

Side response on this. I decided to call some pros (we have a good cellar store here that specializes in custom wine cellars) and talked to a few of them. The consensus from them is that any solidly built *built-in*under-the-counter wine fridge will have enough heat dispersion out the bottom front of the fridge that it will dissipate enough - the bottles above the counter should be unaffected. As long as the average temperature in the overall area doesn't have a large variance (ie less than +/- 10 degrees) I should be in good shape.....