Energy comes from a wide variety of sources (electricity, gas, oil, steam, etc.), and is used in companies all over the world. Although the cost of energy is rising as non-renewable resources are depleted, the good news is that reducing the energy consumption of industrial companies will not only cut costs but also reduce their carbon footprint, while reducing their impact on the environment. And this is the basis on which ARGUMO for an energy audit, which represents an essential starting point for good resource management, by establishing a statement of energy consumption, taking into account the specific characteristics and uses of the site, and identifying measures to improve energy performance.
This audit also aims to conduct a pre-feasibility study of the investments in order to establish the dimensioning and the technical, energetic and economic characteristics of the most interesting measures as well as to set up a demonstration project.
The conduct of such a study generally involves four main phases, namely:
Phase 1: Conducting the energy audit
This starts with a detailed analysis of our plant's energy performance, including an analysis of water and electricity consumption and the share of lighting, air conditioning, electric motors and compressed air compressors in that consumption.
Phase 2: Analysis of data and measurements
After collecting the necessary data on the building and its uses, we move on to identify the main sources of energy consumption, in our case electricity. The goal is to identify the rate of electrical consumption for each utility (lighting, air conditioning, electric motors, compressed air compressors) over a given period, then to extract the possibilities of evolution, the costs of the necessary investments and the expected savings.
Phase 3: Identification of actions to improve energy performance
These are the possible corrective actions and good practices to adopt to preserve the energy efficiency of our plant.
As an example:
- For lighting:
- Have the lamps cleaned regularly
- Position workstations and open window blinds to take full advantage of natural light
- Turn off lights when leaving offices, rooms, etc.
- Putting up posters to raise awareness of rational energy use at the latrine level
- For electric motors
- Installation of Variable Speed Drives (VSDs) on variable load machines
- Use of high-efficiency motors for replacement
- Replacement of rewound motors
- For air compressors
- Installation of air flow meters connected to a control room
- Installation of pressure indicators on the network
- Launch of a leak detection campaign
Phase 4: Technical and economic evaluation and proposal of an action plan
This study of energy performance control of equipment and technical processes, allows the identification of the causes of the overconsumption of energy and the proposal of a plan of actions for recovery to be planned to carry out work or to install a solution of optimization of the energy consumption of our plant.
Today, energy efficiency is seen as a key factor in rationalizing energy consumption. The ambition by ARGUMO is to ensure better use of energy in all its buildings, taking into account the need to optimize and improve energy consumption to meet the growing energy needs of the country and the world as a whole.
