Peterborough, UK: Star has received the TCS&D Award Partnership Award for a project with the Ice Co Storage & Logistics.
The award recognises Star’s Ethos energy management system that has led to a £100,000 annual electricity saving for the Ice Company.
Anne Flanagan, business development management, Star Technical Solutions, said the installation makes a “great case study and example of just how much impact our plant optimisation solution can have on existing refrigeration plants.”
“The company has significantly reduced their annual energy spend and carbon footprint by following the system’s targeted maintenance recommendations – and the customer now plans to roll out Ethos at their other plants across the UK to further mitigate energy costs.”
Ethos energy management software identifies where savings can be made and makes recommendations, such as altering plant settings or making immediate maintenance regime changes. Some recommendations may require capital investment for a bigger percentage loss in energy usage, but many proposals are simple control changes such as altering the condenser fan sequencing to deliver energy savings, the company says.
The partnership with the Ice Co Storage & Logistics reduced carbon emissions by 310 tonnes per year at one of its sites, in addition to saving the customer over £100,000 annually on electricity.
The company now plans to install Ethos at other distribution centres. Joanne Webster, group compliance manager, Ice Co Storage & Logistics said: “We are happy to be used as an example of the fantastic savings that can be made through the quick and easy installation of Ethos – in both energy savings and carbon emissions.
“Many plant users know the system is probably not running as efficiently as it could, but Star Technical Solutions have the knowledge and experience to identify exactly where savings can be made, and many of which are with minor unnoticeable changes in system operation.”
The Ice Company Case Study
Star Technical Solutions its Ethos system into the Wakefield cold storage site of the Ice Co Storage & Logistics to monitor, measure and analyse the performance of its refrigeration plant.
Malcolm Dufton, property and energy director, Ice Company, said “We knew there were savings to be had but Ethos has allowed us to identify where those savings could be made and how. The result over £100,000 saving per annum on electricity, so now we are going to incorporate more plant into the network and roll out the program to our other plants and cold stores.”
Working on knowledge of the plant gained from a maintenance agreement, Star identifed how best to use Ethos to deal with the most wasteful plant first which resulted in an energy consumption reduction of 33% and a consequent drop in emissions of 310 tonnes of CO2 per year. With The Ice Co they identified key areas where Ethos could improve their existing set up:
• Better information regarding performance and efficiency
• Improved operation of the whole plant to enable maximum energy savings
• Alerts when the system detects irregular patterns of behaviour of equipment and improved visibility of operating parameters.
The installation of Ethos consisted of a number of sensors connected to a central Ethos panel. The use of duplicate sensors minimised disruption to the existing operation as well as ensuring correct calibration and accuracy of the collected data. The panel incorporates a programmable logic controller (PLC), which relays the data collected to an SQL server. There is 4G connectivity built into the unit, and therefore there is no requirement for the system to be connected to the existing IT network. In turn, this reduces the workload involved in the installation.
The information collected by the Ethos monitoring system is accessible in seconds via a comprehensive online dashboard, which can be viewed at any time and from anywhere on a smartphone, tablet or computer. This data visibility allowed the Ice Co Storage & Logistics access to an overview of their plant’s performance and to make energy-related savings in two distinct ways:
1) Targeted maintenance and simple control changes. The new system quickly identified that changes to condenser fan sequencing, condenser fan control, low-stage compressor sequencing and system purging would contribute to a cumulative energy saving of around 14%. The actions required to enact these changes were minimal or no cost.
2) Capital investment. Ethos was also capable of identifying areas where equipment upgrades or replacements could improve performance, thus justifying capital investment in new or existing technologies. For example, the compressor health check determined that the isentropic efficiency of one of the compressors was very low. Ethos was able to calculate that by replacing the compressor there would be an additional annual saving of around 24%.
From an operational perspective Ethos has been a valuable addition to The Ice Co Storage & Logistics’ operations toolkit. The client has now continuous access to view the plant’s operating parameters through the Ethos dashboard on a web portal. Operations regularly log in to the online portal to assess the plant conditions from their laptop or phone. In this way, the customer is notified by Monday morning emails of irregular plant behaviour and take pre-emptive steps to address potential issues before they can effect a plant failure.
Ethos has the ability to assess not just how well the plant is performing, but can also map those parameters against how it ideally operate and quantifies the gap between the two in intelligible terms. It is also capable of providing actionable insights into how that gap can be decreased, thus achieving practical optimisation and maximising efficiency. Able to adapt to the constantly changing parameters of a dynamic refrigeration environment, Ethos is adept at assessing system efficiency, regardless of how conditions and load may vary from day to day. In recognition of these capabilities, Ethos was recently awarded 2018 Refrigeration Product of the Year.
Since the system’s installation, Star have established an even closer partnership with the Ice Co, securing a national maintenance contract across its ice manufacturing as well as its cold storage businesses, rolling out Ethos across all of the company’s sites.
