energy management

Energy performance is like a golf score

Calculating energy savings results is like keeping a golf score.  If you ever been on the green, understanding the meaning of CUSUM will come easy. Baseline - how machine is supposed to work or worked before retrofit - is a par. CUSUM - a cumulative sum of deviations from baseline - is a score. If [...]

Energy Efficiency without tears – an energy efficiency encyclopedia – free pdf from the author

I admire professionals who put public good ahead of personal gain. Niall Enright shares his vast practical experience and practical recommendations on finding and implementing a wide range of energy efficiency projects in his book. Free for all. No strings attached. Here is Niall's email with link to download. Dear Anatoli Naoumov, The central [...]

High R2 of baseline model may lead to troubles

When determining energy consumption baseline through regression analysis, as recommended by best practices, sensible energy managers pick a formula that relies of physics of the process, not a formula that produces the highest correlation (R2) between predicted and measured data. In a vast majority of cases relation between energy consumed and it's driver is [...]

Use of average cost per kWh hides savings from CFO

Use of average electricity cost can be misleading when assessing financial impact of energy efficiency measures. What counts is the cost of the last kWh comprised of Global Adjustment (Ontario), demand charges and energy cost. If average cost per kWh is used during project approval, it may become a challenge to show savings to [...]

In energy waste prevention time is of the essence

If your plant underproduced today, you may be able to catch up with schedule by working overtime tomorrow. If you wasted energy today, it is gone forever. No effort tomorrow will help to recover it. Timely action is the key to stop waste before it became to big. Do you know how much energy [...]

How much energy your freezer wastes?

I can't say how much energy your freezer wastes. I do not have a crystal ball, but we saw a few freezers at other companies and I have condensed our observations in a short mock Q&A with a plant manager: Q. Might our freezers work at their best efficiency? A. Yes, it is possible. [...]

Are energy meters like birdhouses or like screws?

It occurred to me that meters relate to energy monitoring in the same way as screws relate to birdhouses. How is that? Some manufacturing plants start energy management from installation of meters. Too often the process ends with meters too. However costly, this result is predictable. I will explain why on an example of [...]

#10. Energy audit saved $125,000 CAPEX

Reduction of air exhaust from refrigerated room reduced cooling load and eliminated need for refrigeration plant upgrade

#9. Energy audit finds $20,000 in energy savings at a cost of a 30 ft pipe.

A perfectly efficient machines can still waste lots of primary or secondary utilities. A complex utility audit routinely uncovers how water, heat or 'cooling' can be reused. Hot water reuse at poultry slaughter house Two industrial poultry processing procedures were set in adjacent production space - vacuum pump and scalding. [...]

#8. Energy audit busts ‘Nothing to save, Everything is automated’ belief

A common objection to doing an energy audit is that 'Everything is fine'. This is rarely the case. Here are two examples when audit uncovered saving opportunities that clients did not know existed because they believed everything was in perfect state already. Efficient equipment does not equate to efficient operation. Sanitation staff turned [...]

Go to Top