Energy Cost savings in an industrial plant

[rockman7892]

I'm looking into ways to start reducing energy costs in my plant. My plant is in the neighborhood of about 18MVA. I know this is a rather vauge question but I just wanted to poke around and see if there were typically any obvious areas in an industrial setting to focus on first when looking at energy cost reduction.

Are there any resources readily avaliabe that cover, or have documented cases and studies showing energy reduction methods in an industrial plant?

I just thought I'd see what the knowledgable folks on this site had to say first before I go out and start focusing my research on a particular area.

 

[EEJaime]

The typical areas of savings would be refitting all lighting with energy efficient systems, utilizing high efficiency motors, transformers, etc.... But for larger types of savings that may be possible with streamlining your processes which utilize energy within the plant, a lot more information about what your plant does, produces, etc..., would be required.

Is it a plant that could utilize the waste heat from a power generation system to offset energy used from the utility currently? Will your utility allow on-site power generation in parallel with the utility? Can you segregate loads to feed from an on-site co-generation system?

Is it a plant that could utilize other types of co-generation systems? Ice storage and harvesting for cooling processes? Natural Gas Absorbtion chillers? Natural Gas Fired generators to directly drive chilled water systems and ramp up and down with demand loads?

There are numerous things that can be done. The options are limited by budget, plant processes, space and schedule constraints. Detailed study and analysis of each of the selected options, including investment requirements, payback analyses and implementation strategies would need to be looked at. And then detailed engineering of the solutions would need to be completed before the solutions can be constructed.

I hope this is somewhat helpful, albeit probably not what you were looking for.

Regards,
EEJaime

 

[ykee]

Check out your demand and consumption, look at your power factor (could do peak shaving and power factor correction, which would reduce your bill). Depending on where you are, peak shaving and power factor correction can be worth lots of $$.

You might want to consider setting up logging equipment to see how and when your electricy is used in different parts of your plant -- that way you can concentrate on areas that consume the most. Of course you should be talking to your process folks to see if things like VFD's should be installed on some motors.

Lighting is sometimes an easy target, although more often than not its a red herring.

I'm going to guess you are not Canadian, but information on Natural Resources Canada webpage would still be worth your time.

http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/industrial/technical-information.cfm?attr=24

 

[Compositepro]

Start by knowing where and how all energy is currently consumed. Most opportunity for savings is in the large energy uses.

Work with the plant process engineers. Plants were built with a certain energy cost expectation. Trade-offs were made between power cost and capital during the design process.

It is very useful to change the light-bulbs if your plant is not competitive with new technology.

After you check out the main energy users, change the lightbulbs.

 

[jghrist]

You also need to review your utility rate structure. How is the demand charge determined? Usually on a maximum monthly 15-minute integrated demand. It could be on a ratchet (one high month sets the charge for a year). You could have a contract demand charge. If so, make sure that it is not set too high. If there is a power factor penalty, the addition of capacitors may be economical.

Talk with your utility to see if there is an alternate rate that would save money. Maybe a time-of-use rate or an interruptible rate.

 

[Zogzog]

Dont fall for the common pitfalls of saving a few bucks by de-energizing back up transformers, cables, etc. They are best left energized.

General Motors is nuts about energy savings, they like to turn off the lights on the vending machines.