Savings for joinery firm

The extraction fans were left running all day as the control panel for them is some distance from the machines they serve. They also had to be started in a set sequence to avoid overloading the supply on start-up. A review of appliances found that circulation fans, extraction fans and the extraction system were consuming the most electricity and were operating inefficiently.

ABB Alliance Drives member Advantage Control installed five ABB general purpose drives beside the main control panel. Benefits include a reduction in energy cost of £13,000 per annum resulting from a cut in the average daily power consumed from 103.3 to 51.4 kW through matching fan motor speed to the demand of the process. This is a saving of 50% and a reduction of 59.79t of CO2 per year.