Free tool · Chillers & freezers
Cold Room Panel Selector
Tell us what you want to keep cold and how big the room is. You get the right panel thickness, how many wall and ceiling panels you need, and whether the floor must be insulated.
How to use it · 3 easy steps
- 1 Choose what you store, for example vegetables or frozen meat.
- 2 Type the room size in metres: length, width and height.
- 3 Read the answer: panel thickness, number of panels and floor advice.
Example: A freezer for frozen chicken, 6 m × 4 m × 3 m, inside a warehouse: about 120 mm panels, 20 wall panels 3 m tall and 6 ceiling panels 4 m long.
1 · What will you keep in the room?
2 · Room size (inside, in metres)
3 · Where is the room?
Your result
| Wall area | |
|---|---|
| Ceiling area | |
| Floor | |
| Temperature difference across the panels | |
| Heat through the panels (walls + ceiling) |
How it works: panel count uses a panel width of 1,000 mm (cold room panels are made 960 mm or 1,000 mm wide), with ceiling panels spanning the shorter side. Door openings are not subtracted. Heat = area × temperature difference × U, with U = λ ÷ thickness for a PU / PIR core (λ 0.022 W/m·K); skins and joints are ignored, so treat it as a comparison figure. A refrigeration engineer sizes the cooling unit. OGB confirms thickness for every project.
Questions
Cold room FAQ
Read the full guide: Cold room panel thickness. Products: Cold room wall panels and Cold storage panels.
What thickness of panel do I need for a cold room?
As a rule of thumb: 75 – 100 mm PU / PIR panels for chillers at 0 to +5 °C, 120 – 150 mm for freezers at −18 to −25 °C, and 150 – 200 mm for blast freezers at −30 to −40 °C. Large rooms, busy doors and hot surroundings push the choice to the thicker size.
How many panels does a cold room need?
Count the walls by the length around the room divided by the panel width (about 1 metre), with each panel as tall as the room. The ceiling is the room length divided by the panel width, with each panel spanning the shorter side. This tool does that count for you.
Does a freezer need an insulated floor?
Yes. Rooms below 0 °C need an insulated floor, often with heating under it, so that the ground below does not freeze and lift the slab. Chillers above 0 °C often use the existing concrete floor.
Is the heat figure the size of the refrigeration unit?
No. The heat figure is only the heat that passes through the panels. A refrigeration engineer also adds heat from doors, goods, people, lights and fans, so the real unit is bigger. Use the figure to compare thicknesses.
Why does the UAE need thicker panels than colder countries?
Heat flow grows with the temperature difference. A freezer at −22 °C next to 45 °C summer air has a 67 °C difference across its walls, much more than in a cool climate, so extra thickness saves more energy here.