Energy Improvement Strategy: Glynwed Brickhouse Foundry

Briefly the Energy Improvement Strategy for the foundry encompassed:

A study of all areas of plant and operations impacting on energy consumption and environmental performance.
Identification of opportunities for the reduction of costs.
Identification of the technical information of relevance to the site and use of best practice and new techniques.

Energy Issue	Measure	Cost	Saving
Compressed air blows to open ends and leaks.	Total cost of compressed air: £55k/an- reduction of leaks and control.	£30k.	£29k/an.
Variable speed drives.	Cost of implementation high.	High.	£50k (estimated).
Disposal of slag.	Spin slag into fibre for use as a high temperature insulator.	THERMIE application recommended.	£200k (estimated).
Electricity consumption at night and weekend remains higher than expected.	New core-belter required and/or changes to compressed air system. A new core-belter can be operated on a JIT basis, grant monies are availlable.	Unknown.	£10k.
Implementation of a programme of monitoring and targeting.	Constant monitoring of utilities costs against target.	£18k.	£55k.
Purchasing contract changes.	Sensitive due to group involvement: The pool trading arrangements are showing instability at the moment and a fixed rate contract is advised for risk management (hedging).	£5k	£10k.