In this news release, the Department of Energy touts its assessment of different manufacturing facilities.
And once you get pass the news release and look at all of the information that the DOE brings to bear in these assessments, you can see how simple saving millions of dollars can be.
If you have never been in a manufacturing environment, some of these helpful hints may not make any sense because it is not about light bulbs or vampire plugs. It is about heat and motors and air pressure.
Keeping heat controlled in a manufacturing process where you can apply it where you want efficiently is big. How could Hershey’s melt chocolate without heat?
A leaky compressed air system causes air compressors to run harder and longer.
Motors are used on conveyor belts and to move things around. If those are not set up right, if a belt is slipping, or if the axle is bent, more energy is used.
The DOE has been to 500 different plants. They have identified $800 million in energy savings.
Here is a quote about the 500th plant:
The 500th assessment was conducted at the Dow Chemical Company Freeport, Texas plant. Dow Chemical participated in Save Energy Now assessments at 16 of its facilities in 2006 and 2007. Plant engineers and technicians benefited from the evaluations of various plant energy system projects. The assessments identified $31 million per year in potential savings. As of April 2008, thirteen of the Dow plants have reported to DOE that $7.7 million in savings have been implemented and another $7 million of energy savings projects are in progress.
How much could each manufacturing plant get in savings by just following the simple easy recommendations? It is probably billions.
But all of this got me thinking.
I don’t work in manufacturing. I am an information worker. I sit at my cube, drink the free coffee and tea, send emails, participate on conference calls and work on spreadsheets and databases. When is the DOE going to set up an assessment program for the information worker?
I am thinking of things like control over lights and vampire plugs. reminding people to turn off their computers and monitors at night, having a sleep mode for coffee pots that keep water heated all of the time, and even better insulated soda dispensers.
I do not know how much energy would be saved. But I think that there is enough of us that a lot of energy and money would be saved.
