Midlands innovation leads to a World First and puts the region on the map for reducing industry energy costs and improving sustainability.
The Midlands is renowned for its engineering skills and expertise. The region has been an important influence on many areas of manufacturing and industry for hundreds of years.
Today, a Coventry company continues to put the region on the map as it strives to help industries improve their sustainability and lower energy consumption without any compromise on productivity or performance.
Sentridge Control supply,install and commission inverter drives & motors, an important part of the day to day running for many industries. These drives control the amount of energy used to run machines such as conveyers, cranes and water pumps and are used by companies in the Water, Transport, Building and Manufacturing industries. The drives are manufactured in Europe by ABB, who are recognised as World leaders. ABB now recognise that the added value provided by Sentridge’s improvement to their product is going to make their position even stronger.
Glen Hickman, Technical Director at Sentridge, said: “We have supplied and installed the UK’s first IE4 synchronous reluctance motor and drive package (SynRM) and have proven results from its first test site, a local water pumping station. The result is an additional 6 percent energy saving for South Staffs Water and when they spend more than £9 million a year on electricity this 6% amounts to a significant saving. The energy saved on this one site alone would be enough provide power for 5 homes.”
“The biggest benefit, above all others, is the 6 percent reduction in energy,” explains Keith Marshall, Supply Director at South Staffs Water. “While being one of the most efficient companies in the industry, our electricity bill is more than £9 million per year and rising through increases in wholesale energy prices. Pumping water accounts for some 90 percent of this spend as we have the highest pumping head of any UK water utility because of the hilly terrain within our catchment area. So a 6 percent reduction on one pump in a system that was already very efficient is massive news for us.
“Electric motors are used to provide the power to turn the pumps that provide water to our homes and when 90% of your energy costs down to this one simple device it is clearly and area for potential improvement.
“Including the UK government’s Enhanced Capital Allowances (ECAs), we estimate the return on investment to be between five to six years. Given that the existing drive and motor were already fairly efficient and therefore squeezing more savings was always going to be difficult, then this is a very acceptable return.”
Eleven months after being voted Europe’s automation product of the year (the Oscar’s for Electrical Automation), South Staffs Water are the first Water Utility in the UK to take advantage of this breakthrough in motor design and technology. The really clever things is the machine only uses standard raw materials that are found in every motor but radically redesigned and engineered to maximise the efficiency levels.
Contact us today to see how Sentridge can help you and your business!
