Technology

A complete compressed air system assessment should provide detailed information on both the supply and demand sides of the system. The supply-side refers to the equipment supplying compressed air – the air compressor, dryers, filters, piping and storage tanks.  The purpose of this article is to illustrate what information we believe a factory should receive from a supply-side system assessment and more importantly – what information a plant should always know about their compressed air system.

A newly constructed ethanol plant experienced control gap issues shortly after comissioning.  This article discusses the cause of the issue and how the problem was solved.

This article will talk about testing.  I will assume a “typical” system, a screw air compressor mix with regenerative dryers. Testing has to be done at several stages and locations, due to the cobbled-together nature of a compressed air system.

A pharmaceutical product manufacturer spends an estimated \$137,443 annually on electricity to operate the oil-free air compressors in its compressed air system. The compressed air system operates well and is providing the level of purification required.  Our team visited the plant and identified a group of projects which could reduce compressed air demand and reduce energy costs by \$42,248 – or 31% of current use.

A large pharmaceutical company needed huge flow rates of 30 psig air to aerate multiple fermentation processes which create food-grade materials.  Flow could vary from about 12,000 scfm to 35,000 scfm.  There were a variety of batch processes, mostly running independently.  An hour-by-hour schedule for anticipated air flow is developed every afternoon for the next day.  Based on that schedule, the boiler operators run the air compressors that can handle the load range for the whole day. In reality, the peak flow can be higher than anticipated.

Compressed Air Best Practices® Magazine interviewed Mr. Warwick Rampley, the National Sales Manager for Sydney (Australia) based, Basil V.R. Greatrex Pty Ltd.

It’s not every day one is asked to deliver a system able to provide both a reliable compressed air dew point of -80°C (-112°F) and high purity nitrogen.  We work with some excellent technology suppliers and have engineered a rather interesting system.  Although our firm was founded in 1919, this application is one of the most demanding we’ve encountered. Basil V.R. Greatrex is a unique company as we focus only on compressed air measurement, compressed air quality and compressed air efficiency.

The Lafarge Cement Distribution terminal located in Winnipeg, Canada has significantly reduced the site electrical demand and energy charges by changing the way they transport their cement.  Two new low-pressure rotary screw air compressors have replaced two large high-pressure air compressors that previously powered their dense phase transport system.  The resulting power reduction has saved the company 46 percent in transport operating costs.

A centrifugal air compressor operates over a range of flows and discharge pressures. The operating performance curve is shaped by the selected individual internal components and affected by operating conditions such as inlet pressure, inlet temperature, and cooling water temperature. The process of dynamic compression, as applied in a centrifugal compressor operating stage, is velocity and kinetic energy converted to pressure and temperature as the flow is restricted. Another term for this process is mass flow – the power requirement to deliver the rated cfm of flow at the rated pressure (psig) is determined by the weight of the air.

Compressed air is dried to prevent condensation and corrosion which can disrupt manufacturing processes and contaminate products. Water is the primary promotor of chemical reactions and physical erosion in compressed air systems. A myriad of desiccant dryer designs have been devised to provide “commercially dry” air, air having a dew point of -40°F or less, to prevent corrosion.  Desiccant dryers use solid adsorbents in granule form to reduce the moisture content of compressed air.

Quite often the typical variability in compressed air flow demand does not proportionately translate into power reductions at the air compressors. This can be a result of numerous problems with the compressed air supply system. It is important to understand the supply-side’s ability to respond to the demand-side of the compressed air system. If the air compressors, on the supply-side, are not able to translate flow reductions into energy savings, implementation of demand reduction projects should be re-evaluated.