In general, an absorption chiller or heat pump is operated under the constant cooling water flow rate condition even though the system works with a partial load. The objective of this paper is to study the effect of the cooling water flow rates and the temperature of cooling water on the system performance to find the energy saving methode for the partial load operation of the double effect $H_2O$/LiBr absorption chiller. It is found that the performance of the system is sensitive to the temperature of cooling water than the cooling water flow rate, so the decrease of the performance due to reducing the cooling water flow rate can be overcome with the reduction of the cooling water temperature by 1$^{circ}C$. The flow rate of the cooling water flow rate ranges from 50％ to 100％ of the flow rate at normal conditions with a partial load. It is also found that the operation cost of the cooling water pump and the cooling tower can be reduced by 23％.