Industrial Utility Efficiency

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Reducing Brewing Costs with Onsite Nitrogen Generation

By Nathaniel Holliday, Randy Peccia, Jennifer Fiorello, Parker Hannifin

Brewing is normally broken down into four stages-malting, mashing, boiling and fermenting. The complex chemical processes begin with a few simple ingredients - hops, grain, yeast and water. Recently there have been technological advancements to safeguard that these steps are attained accurately, efficiently and with cost-savings. One particular improvement is the use of nitrogen during the brewing process. The addition of an onsite nitrogen generator allows brewers to reduce their nitrogen costs, eliminate downtime, and reduce safety risks related to bulk gas cylinder delivery and changeouts.
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Clean and Dry Compressed Air Drives Success at Five Churches Brewing

By Mike Grennier, Compressed Air Best Practices® Magazine

Compressed air is a critical aspect of brewing craft beer and no one understands that better than Five Churches Brewing, which recently looked to MidState Air Compressor, Inc. to recommend and install an appropriate compressed air system for virtually every aspect of beer production including brewing, canning and keg washing.  
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Pneumatics Boost Productivity of Doroti Pack Thermoforming Machine

By Daniel Math, Aventics

For more than 20 years, Hungarian-based Doroti Pack Ltd. has specialized in the production and servicing of state-of-the-art packaging machines. Their focus is on developing, manufacturing, producing and selling premium-quality packaging equipment, including their line of DorPack thermoforming machines which are often used for food products such as fresh meat, fish, dairy products, bakery ware, confectionery and ready-cooked foods. Dorati Pack chose to incorporate Aventics pneumatic components in latest thermoforming machine for optimal productivity and machine longevity.
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Lessons Learned: Saving Energy Costs with Heated Blower Desiccant Dryers

By Ron Marshall, Marshall Compressed Air Consulting

Experienced auditors become wary when they see desiccant dryers installed in customers’ plants. These dryers are required when a plant needs instrument-quality compressed air, or when compressed air piping is exposed to freezing temperatures. However, while desiccant dryers can gain this level of quality, the energy cost of stepping up from a dewpoint of 35°F to a level of -40°F increases quite considerably. To attempt to reduce the energy costs of drying to these low levels, heated blower desiccant styles may be used. This article describes three common desiccant dryer types, as well as some experiences, good and bad, with heated blower types.
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Reviewing Dust Collectors and Nitrogen in a Food Manufacturing Plant

By Hank van Ormer, Van Ormer Consulting

This major food manufacturing plant in the Midwest uses compressed air and onsite nitrogen generation to operate multiple snack production and packaging lines. The plant spends an estimated \$430,344 annually on energy to operate its compressed air system based on an average rate of 4.5 cents per kWh.
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Assessment Reveals Air Compressor Control Gap Issues

By Ron Marshall, Marshall Compressed Air Consulting

A food processor in Western Canada hired an auditor to assess the energy efficiency of its compressed air system. The results revealed surprises about the operation of some important elements of the system, and detected that the air compressors were having control gap problems. Additionally, the audit led to initial energy savings of \$20,000 – and identified the potential to achieve overall operational savings of 45%. The following details some of the audit findings and results.
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Common System Issues Part 1 - Oil-Free Air Compressors Paired with Heatless Desiccant Dryers

By Tim Dugan, P.E. President, Compression Engineering Corporation

Many food processing plants are already using oil-free compressed air at a low-pressure dewpoint. This has required the use of two-stage oil-free screw air compressors, centrifugal air compressors and other technologies, as well as regenerative dryers of one type or another. The most common oil-free air compressor in industry is the two-stage “dry screw” machine and the most common regenerative dryer type is the heatless type. These are combined in many food processing, pharmaceutical, and high-tech plants.    
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Safety: Food-Compliant Pneumatics for Fully Aseptic Juice Filling Machine

By Aventics

Machines for filling milk or juice must often work around the clock. Given the critical importance of uptime, Elopak opted for Aventics food-compliant pneumatics when developing its E-PS120A - the first fully aseptic filling machine for gable top packaging. With an output of up to 12,000 cartons per hour, disruptions and downtime are not welcome with the aseptic filling machine.
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Auto

Hyster-Yale Sustainability Recognized by North Carolina DEQ
Hyster-Yale’s Greenville, North Carolina, plant reduced compressed air waste through employee-driven
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Bulk

Compressed Air at a West Texas Silica Mine
Compressed air system reliability relies on engineering expertise, environmental management and
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Food

Leland Brewing Adopts Modular Nitrogen Generation
A modular nitrogen generation system integrated with compressed air infrastructure enabled on-site
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Medical

An Overview of Medical Air Packages
The air is delivered through a distribution piping system that ends with a medical air outlet within
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Metals

IPS Advises Midwest Industry on Compressed Air Efficiency
IPS supplies compressed air to a lot of machinery running outdoors, such as dust collectors and feed
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Paper

Best Practices for Acoustic Inspections in the Pulp and Paper Industry
Detecting Compressed Air Leaks Can Lead to Reduced Energy Waste, Boosted Productivity, and Improved
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Pharmaceutical

GMP Compliant Monitoring of Pharmaceutical Plant Compressed Air Systems
This article is intended to show the relationships between risks and specifications, opportunities
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Plastics

Rotary Screw Booster Advances for Blow Molding
Compressed air boosters are engineered to amplify medium-pressure air (90–150 psig) to high-pressure
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Power

Air Compressor Control Gap Issues Solved at an Ethanol Plant
A newly constructed ethanol plant experienced control gap issues shortly after comissioning. 
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Printing

Blue Mountain Reins in a Sprawling Compressed Air System
The plant was intermittently operating a staggering 11 air compressors scattered across its facility
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Transit

Renew Energy Partners Fixes Variable Demand on a Large Campus
An aerospace manufacturer worked with Renew Energy Partners to address energy waste caused by
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Wastewater

Air Compressor Design Considerations for a Successful Compressed Gas Mixing Project
Compressed Gas Mixing provides uniform mixing of water or wastewater tank contents by firing
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