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ECS2 Group

9-6975 Meadowvale Town Centre Circle

Mississauga, Ontario L5N 2V7

Canada

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Natural Resources Canada                                                                        

April 15, 2008 Vol. XII, No. 8

High cost of compressed air

Many industrial plant managers don't know it but they could easily find out the true cost of wasted compressor energy by conducting a proper energy audit. That's what Nels Hedman discovered when he attended a training workshop about air leak detection. Now the maintenance coordinator at GE Consumer & Industrial's lamp plant in Oakville, Ontario, is implementing a leak-prevention plan at the facility.

“The energy savings that can be achieved by conducting a proper audit are substantial,” Hedman says. When his team performed a compressed air survey at the facility, with the help of ECS2 Group Inc., a consulting and training firm, the team found 12 leaks in one of the plant's 20 production machines. Hedman estimates the annual cost of the leaks for one machine is over $3,000. “Over the next year, we'll be costing wasted energy from the rest of the equipment.”

Hedman has arranged for his team of machinists and millwrights to take the Air Leak Surveyor Certification Training Course offered by ECS2. The objective of the one-day course is to help participants learn about the physics of air leaks, proper testing methods and cost savings appraisal. The training course includes hands-on Air Leak Survey inspections so participants will know what to do when they get back to their facility to implement what they learned.

While compressed air is commonly used in typical industrial facilities, ECS2 founder Liane Harris says it is also one of the most wasteful systems in terms of energy use. “We've been through plants where we've found anywhere between 200 and 400 leaks,” Harris says. “The longer they go undetected, the more they hurt your productivity and the efficiency of the plant from an energy cost perspective.”

According to Harris, if industrial plants are not proactive, anywhere from 20 to 40 percent of compressed air can be lost because of improper installation, machine failure, faulty compressor controls or poor maintenance. Harris also cites pinholes and loose connections and fittings as some of the many causes of compressed air literally “leaking back out into the atmosphere.” The compressor operates to produce compressed air that just leaks out without doing the work that the compressed air was meant to do.

The challenge is to discover where the leaks are. Many large leaks are audible when plant systems are down and the plant floor is quiet. It isn't enough to walk through the plant because it's impossible to hear air escaping when machinery is operating. “You'll miss out on 80 percent of the leaks,” says Harris. Finding them by feel is also unreliable, possibly unsafe, and very time consuming.

In running their diagnostics, both ECS2 and GE Lighting use ultrasound devices and acoustic magnification techniques that can pick up high frequency sounds generated by air leaks normally too low to be perceptible to the human ear.

Hedman is looking forward to a year from now when most of the compressed air leaks will be fixed. “It'll take some work, but once we get on top of it, I know the energy savings will be worth it.”