Page 39 - Glass Machinery Plants & Accessories no. 1-2019

cantly, and this might be due to a
machine using too much air. So
when you have this information
you can do something about this
– working on the control systems,
for example.
To enable manufacturers – and
glassmakers in this case – to be
able to solve these kinds of prob-
lems, we supply the tools, the soft-
ware and the sensors, and we work
together with energy consultants.
Energy consultants, in fact, go into
the factories and carry out assess-
ments and permanent monitoring
jobs, and they can then advise the
clients on the next and correct step
to take to get the biggest return on
investment. you consider these
And we are not only speak- important figures
ing about saving energy, but also it’s still sometimes
saving time because if you know difficult to convince
where the ‘problem’ is you can everybody within the manufactur-
also save time on maintenance, ing plant, because we are speaking
as well as machine down time of about air – and air is considered
course. Last but not least, improv- as free, while it is actually the most
ing machinery performance. expensive aspect.
Sometimes you can actually see
when something is going to fail GMP&A: How do you convince
and so you can take action before them that it’s not free?
it actually happens. VPInstruments: Sometimes
people know or find out about
GMP&A: Are you connected to it from published white papers
companies that use your monitor- or studies, and other times it can
ing system, and do you give them be because an audit company has
remote assistance with regards to come to measure the different
feedback? flows around the manufacturing
VPInstruments: Plants usually plant and you can see that the
invest in a monitoring system that tions. Some plants, for example, air is still being used even at the
we offer, which provides software, will invest in 500 measurement weekend when there is no work
alarms and alerts, or they already points, measuring the electric- going on at the plant. In that case
have this kind of equipment in ity consumption of machines, and you can convert this number into
place so that they just buy from then of course compressed air. Euros per year, and talk about
us the sensors so that it can be how to reduce these costs.
used for compressed air applica- GMP&A: How important is Other benefits coming from
compressed air in a system? these kinds of savings also include
VPInstruments: In the glass better ways of carrying out main-
industry, if you look at costs, the tenance, also preventing machine
compressed air system is typically stops.
between 1 and 2 megawats. This A lot of big companies now
would be about EUR 1.5 to 2 mil- have global energy management
lion out of an annual energy bill of programmes so if they have about
about EUR 7 million. 50 plants around the world they
As a percentage it’s about 30 are aiming at doing benchmarking
per cent of a normal electricity – they want to see if a plant is using
bill for glassworks. And even if more air than others and why.

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