Garish pink isn't the obvious colour choice for a compressor. But perhaps it should be judging by the number of site managers failing to spot this essential piece of factory kit's untapped potential to bring down their energy bills.
Assembled site managers at WM's Compressed Air Time report roundtable echoed the indifference towards compressors apparent in our research findings last month (WM, May issue, p40).
"We spend a lot of time training our staff on power, turning off things saving money but we don't spend the same time and effort looking at air, " remarked Chris Greenough, director of Salop Design & Engineering. "I think it goes back to air being perceived as one of the lower services in all of our minds."
"People think compressed air is free," said Matthew Schofield, utilities engineer at Dr Reddy's Laboratories. "It's a site commodity they don't see the cost of because they're only involved in production and it's on tap. We've now introduced sub-metering. It helps us builds up a picture."
Some basic measurements and the compressor begins to be painted in a very different light. Machines can account for 30% of a sites' total electricity consumption with 80% of input energy being lost as waste heat, delegates heard. Some simple adjustments and your compressor could double up as a hot water source for the post shift round of tea.
We'll drink to that summed up Nick Bion, MD at Robert Bion."I can't help feeling there's an awful lot more we could do with our energy management in terms of our compressor. We don't know what we use daily, weekly or monthly. There's a big gap there for us."
Bridging the divide is down to simple dashboard metrics added Bion. "The one thing I'd want on a new compressor would be an app on our computer that tells you how much power its using and if you want to get someone like me excited, how much it's costing."
"It's there," responded Mark Keen, business line manager at compressor manufacturer and service provider, Atlas Copco. The firm provides Smartlink, a data monitoring device that tracks three key areas of compressor performance including upcoming servicing requirements based on actual usage, early warning of a potential compressor problem and 24/7 analysis of a unit's energy efficiency.
The latter syncs with your site IT and provides updated energy performance data every six minutes according to Keen. "You can generate a report as a PDF or graph at the end of the month so you can see the impact of changes in the shift pattern or repairing air leaks, "he said. The device costs £900 [checking] per month.
But the prospect of real time performance monitoring didn't have everyone reaching for their debit cards. "It all depends on the cost of your downtime. People don't even know [that cost] in most factories," said David Fox, chairman and CEO of PP Electrical Systems.
WM's research findings suggest an average bill of around £3,500. That figure was likely to be a conservative one warned Bion. "With downtime there's all the knock on effects you just don't see. There's the effort that goes into re-arranging your business, reprogramming the machine and that all sucks in management time."
Perhaps the distress explained the peculiar trend of retaining a second, emergency, compressor among assembled site managers. There wasn't a back-up mobile phone or laptop in the room, but everyone carried a spare compressor as standard. "It's normally the old compressor", reflected Keen of Atlas Copco. "It's run once a month just to make sure it turns over. If you are running it then any efficiency gains, air quality gains are gone. You're at risk of contaminating your air system. It's a get out of jail card but it's a compromise."
The anomaly highlighted the urgent need to update the manufacturing manager's compressed air almanac. "My impression about compressed air is its old fashioned technology," mused Fox. "Nobody looks at it as something to take your business forward. It's just the same as it was 50 years ago."
Atlas Copco attendees, Keen and his colleague Craig Simpson were keen to set the record straight: "Each time there's an advance, you're getting more litres per second of air out of the compressor for less kW," said Simpson. "When I first started off it was four cfm and now it's up to nearly six, which is a big leap of nearly 50% in output...a newer compressor will be more efficient, less likely to breakdown, the components are of better standard and variable speed drives (VSD) move on at a pace we can barely keep up with."
VSD related savings alone will trim 25% to 40% of your compressor running costs added Keen. Modern units also deliver cleaner, higher quality air, thanks to advances in air filtration, that will extend the lifespan of your air tools, he stated. It should all add up to a compelling case for regular conversations over compressor replacement.
Yet WM's research found manufacturing sites putting their cast of compressors on a protracted run to rival the Mousetrap. Nine in ten UK sites won't consider replacing, already ageing compressors until at least the 2020s according to WM's research.
Bucking the make do and mend mentality is a must if UK firms are to stay competitive in the face of soaring energy costs, roundtable delegates concurred. And that investment will come a lot faster with more extensive examples of compressor savings from the air equipment industry, site leaders agreed.
Greenough concluded: "If you could do something to report the benefits with case studies of real manufacturing businesses behind it that would have so much value. If you said to me: 'you're going to save £2,000 a year and a new compressor cost £8,000' then you've probably talked me into a new compressor...we as manufacturers need to see what savings we can make and how that can be reported into our financials"
Three big lessons
- What you measure, you manage: Managers want real-time dashboard metrics to assess compressor activity against overall electricity bills. Suppliers say tracking technology is ready to go.
- More concrete savings data: Site bosses urged suppliers to develop more comprehensive data on the potential cost savings from upgrading compressor kit and back it up with case studies to help them with investment proposals.
- Help us tackle the air is free myth: an air is free mentality still prevailed in many production areas and wasn't help by a tendency to exclude operations from training, delegates said. Sites called for more help from suppliers in helping them come up with a best practice campaign to change shopfloor mindsets.
