The huge compressed air savings potential

Energy savings are getting more and more a hot topic. There are worldwide initiatives, directives and agreements to stop climate change and limit the overall CO2 emissions. Consumers are becoming critical and demand products that are produced in a sustainable way. Furthermore, many production plants are becoming more aware of the huge cost reductions involved with energy savings. So, factories are looking to reduce steam, natural gas and electrical consumption by installing e.g. solar panels, investing in wind farms, turning to LED lighting and switching to heat recovery.

Don’t overlook compressed air!

Unfortunately, there is one large savings opportunity that is often overlooked and that is compressed air! Even today, we see in the workplace that compressed is considered as “free”! This could not be any further away from the truth as it is one of the most expensive utilities. Also, in many plants, production output is still prioritized above reducing compressed air consumption. While not monitoring your compressed air system can even result in production stops as a result of e.g. broken machines.

Facts about energy costs

To open your eyes, we have gathered here below a few facts about the costs of compressed air and the savings potential.

• Independent research in the US, Australia and Europe (1), has shown that 4 to 5% of the global electricity consumption is taken up by compressed air. This has one of the largest industrial savings potentials of 233 TWh.
  
• More than 75% of the total costs of ownership of a compressor is taken up by energy costs. The other 25% are for buying the compressor and maintenance. So rather investing all your time in selecting the most affordable or even the most efficient machine on the market, put all your efforts in selecting the right compressor for your specific compressed air usage. If the most efficient compressor in the world is too large for your application or not controlled properly, this will cost you more over time.

• Did you know that compressed air is the 3rd or 4th utility within most production companies?

• Compressed air takes up 10 to 30% of the electrical bill of an average industrial company?

• Compressed air is 8 to 10 times more expensive than electricity. Why? 85% Of the energy generated by a compressor comprises of heat. Only 15% is air. Although there are some nice heat recovery projects (for example heating of buildings), in many cases, the heat cannot be re-used properly.

• Compressed is even more expensive when you consider its actual usage in the factory. Studies have shown that only 50% of compressed air is used for production, the other 50% involves leakages, artificial demand and inappropriate use.
  

Why use compressed air?

So ok, why use compressed air at all then? Well in many cases it is still a necessary evil, e.g. for bottle-blowing machines in glass manufacturing plants, for painting of car bodies or for safety reasons in specific ATEX zones. However, there are still many ways to reduce compressed air usage significantly. Investing in flow meters, power meters and monitoring software can reveal where you can reduce consumption and optimize. Therefore, this investment will payback easily.

References

Others went before you and got great savings! Here is a small selection: