Energy savings the driving force for industry schemes
5 Jun 2003
Two of the leading control companies in the UK are each offering to help process operators reap significant savings in energy costs. Mitsubishi Electric and ABB have independently introduced schemes that aim to make it easier to justify investment in energy saving measures.
'The Carbon Tax has added 10-20 per cent to most companies' energy bills,' says Chris Cusick, who heads up Mitsubishi's new Melsmart Energy Centre. He sees the main problem in attempting to implement energy saving as one of complexity. 'There are lots of sources of information on efficiency' he says, 'but working through them and determining what is best for any one situation is a massive task.'
The new Energy Centre (www.energycentre.org) effectively will undertake that task for its clients by offering a full 'end-to-end' efficiency service. This could include consultancy, energy audits and surveys, action plans, installation and long-term performance monitoring. Although the company's strengths are in process and motion control, its advice will extend far beyond merely recommending the installation of variable speed drives. For technologies outside of its in-house expertise, it has signed up partners who currently can give advice in areas such as gas consumption, lighting, power management, heating, refrigeration and compressed air.
One of the first initiatives to come out of the Energy Centre is an equipment leasing scheme. Although centred around Mitsubishi's F540 variable speed inverter drive, the scheme can be expanded to include the whole system into which it is built.
ABB's latest initiative to promote energy efficiency builds on the success of the company's Six Steps energy savings plan launched in 2000 with eight ABB Alliance partners.
According to James Haigh, ABB's senior vice-president for drive products, the scheme has so far generated savings of £2.5million for process companies such as Solutia, Croda and Scottish Water.
'However,' he says, 'many financial directors and controllers still find it difficult to release money for non-capital expenditure.' ABB has therefore launched an 'energy payback calculator', on www.abb.co.uk/energy, that evaluates the benefits of buying variable speed drives using the government's Action Energy loan scheme for small to medium enterprises (SMEs).
'This is a group where cash flow issues can be of paramount importance, regardless of the energy saving potential,' explains Haigh. 'With an Action Energy loan, we can propose a repayment option that is tailored to the customer.'
