Industrial energy audit

Process, compressed air, motors and steam — where the energy actually goes in a plant.

Industrial energy is a different problem from building energy. In most plants the building envelope is close to irrelevant and the load is process: motors, compressed air, steam, refrigeration, ovens and furnaces. An auditor who arrives with a residential mindset will spend a day looking at the roof.

We start from the energy balance and the production data together, because energy per unit of output is the number that means something. A plant that reduced consumption while reducing output has not improved.

The recurring findings are unglamorous and large: compressed air leaks running at twenty to thirty per cent of generation, compressors sized for a peak that happens twice a year, motors running unloaded on nights and weekends, steam traps failed open, and refrigeration set colder than the product needs because someone once had a complaint.

In Alberta this work is funded. The SEMI programme pays up to $50,000 towards an energy assessment or audit at a single facility, at up to half the cost, and up to the whole cost for Indigenous-led and not-for-profit applicants. Waitlists are open on every activity.

Industrial — the rest of it