On the client’s large industrial site, several compressed air production facilities had been
built over the years as the needs of production grew. Each stood by itself supplying its own local area. To guard against production loss during maintenance periods or when a compressor failed, each compressor house had an n + 1 design philosophy.

Analysis of the electrical loading of the seven installed compressors across three plant rooms revealed that they spent much of their time spinning but producing little output as they were oversized and poorly controlled.

The solution was to link the three plant rooms.

The whole of the site can now be supplied by one large fixed speed compressor and one VSD unit. If any loss of pressure is detected in the newly linked system, one or two of the compressors in that area will automatically start to make up the shortfall whether caused by a failure elsewhere or by increased demand.

With offload running and running hours reduced, electricity and maintenance costs have fallen dramatically. At the same time, the interlinking of the three compressor houses has provided the resilience that modern business continuity management demands.