Is Your Manufacturing Operation Using Too Much Electricity?
Running your own manufacturing operation is a good way to gain control over your products and save money in the long term. However, the initial start-up and running costs are very high and it’s important that you find ways to save money wherever you can. It’s equally important that you are able to find ways to reduce your impact on the environment when manufacturing products and you can achieve both of those things by reducing the amount of electricity that your manufacturing operation uses.
A factory uses a lot of power and although there is a lot of necessary usage, there is also a lot of waste as well. Finding ways to reduce that waste is the key to saving money and reducing your impact on the environment. These are some of the most effective ways to cut electricity usage in your manufacturing operation.
Perform An Energy Audit
Before you are able to reduce your energy usage, you need to perform an energy audit to see whether there are any areas where waste is a big problem. In many cases, you can make changes based on the findings of your energy audit, like installing instrument transformers to manage the voltage used in machinery and control panels, for example. You may also want to consider upgrading certain machines that are particularly power intensive. After the audit is completed, you should have a clear list of all of the problem areas that need to be dealt with.
Use Automated Lights
We all know that leaving the lights on is an easy way to waste energy at home, so why do it in your manufacturing facility? So many lights get left on in areas where nobody is working and a lot of the time, employees are moving from place to place without switching any lights off as they go. In a large facility, this amounts to a lot of wasted energy but there is a simple solution. Installing an automated lighting system that switches the lights off automatically when nobody is in the room will save you so much energy over the years and it’s a very cheap and easy change to make.
Switch To LEDs
Making the switch to LEDs is another simple change that will save a lot of electricity. LED bulbs use over 75% less energy than a normal bulb. In a large manufacturing facility with a lot of lights, those savings quickly add up. They also last a lot longer, so you don’t need to worry about replacing them anywhere near as often.
Maintain Your Manufacturing Equipment
Equipment maintenance is so important for a number of reasons. Firstly, it helps to prevent any breakdowns so your manufacturing operation always runs smoothly and you don’t experience expensive downtime. It also improves the lifespan of machinery, which saves you a lot of money because you don’t need to keep replacing incredibly costly equipment. Regular cleaning and maintenance of manufacturing equipment also means that it will run far more efficiently and use less electricity overall.
Make sure that all of your employees follow good practice when shutting down machines and they give them a good clean. You also need to give all equipment a deep clean on a regular basis. During your routine cleaning and maintenance, it’s important that you fix any problems before they get worse. If you neglect small issues, they will soon turn into larger ones and equipment will not be as efficient.
Upgrade Your Machinery
It’s very important to keep up with maintenance to improve efficiency but very old equipment will be inefficient regardless of how well looked after it is. Newer machines are a lot more energy efficient than old ones so even though you think that you are saving money by keeping outdated equipment, your electricity costs will be through the roof. It’s much cheaper and more eco-friendly in the long term if you pay for newer equipment.
Modern machines also have a lot of added safety features and shut off mechanisms, so your employees will be safer and you can reduce the risk of injury.
Upgrade Heating Systems
In a large manufacturing facility with lots of open spaces, heating and air conditioning costs are incredibly high. It is estimated that 20 to 40 percent of the building’s energy usage is made up by heating and cooling. It’s important that you keep the environment comfortable for your employees so you can’t avoid these costs completely, but you do need to find ways to make heating and cooling more energy efficient. Old climate control systems are very inefficient so it may be worth considering an upgrade. Although the initial cost is high, you will save a lot of money in electricity costs in the long run.
You should also check what kind of insulation you have on the building. Most manufacturing facilities are quite poorly insulated but if you are willing to invest a bit of money on it, you can cut your energy usage even further.
Even if you don’t want to invest any money, you can reduce your electricity usage a lot if you turn the thermostat down a few degrees. The difference in temperature is not noticeable but the difference in energy use over the years will be.
Streamline Processes
When designing products, you need to think about how many different processes are involved in each stage of manufacturing. Each process requires equipment to be run and so it uses energy, which means that streamlining processes is one of the most effective ways to cut your electricity usage.
You should audit all of your different manufacturing processes and see whether there are any changes that can be made. In some cases, you may even find that you are able to remove entire machines from the process, saving a lot of electricity.
Improving efficiency and cutting costs should always be a priority in manufacturing. Electricity usage is one of the largest costs that you have, but if you follow these steps, you can cut your electricity costs in half.