Intelligent energy efficient process ventilation
As part of the green transition, industrial companies need new system solutions for energy efficient process ventilation. The project develops and demonstrates new intelligent solutions for process ventilation with reduced air volumes, smaller systems, reduced energy consumption for air transport and efficient options for air purification, heat recovery and recirculation. The technologies include intelligent process extraction and intelligent control of the process ventilation in interaction with the room ventilation. The focus is on energy efficient process ventilation and a healthy working environment. The solutions based on the corresponding design tool with instructions and a product catalog are disseminated to the national and international market by the participating industries and companies.
The phasing out of fossil fuels has created a need for new well-documented energy-efficient and cost-effective system solutions for industrial process ventilation, as there are significant electricity and energy savings associated with the improvement of existing solutions.
The project contributes to reducing the consumption of electricity and energy in the industry through technology development and demonstration of new IoT based intelligent solutions for process ventilation and intelligent process extraction. The focus is on air volumes, air purification, recirculation and heat recovery, interaction with the building ventilation, and not least the working environment.
The comprehensive project is carried out in close collaboration between the Danish Technological Institute, the energy company AURA's advisory function, and the trade associations VELTEK (ventilation producers) and FAV (ventilation contractors), as well as five specific producers, and selected demonstration hosts in the Danish Industry. The project team is thus composed to represent the entire value chain with updated competencies in research, development, demonstration, documentation and market knowledge in connection with process ventilation.
The developed and demonstrated solutions for intelligent process extraction and for total process ventilation, including an associated design tool with instructions and product catalog, will be disseminated to the national and international markets by the participating industries and companies. The results provide input to the ventilation industry's further development of products and systems and commercial marketing.
A new concept and a prototype for adaptive welding extraction have been developed, where the extracted air volume is adjusted to the current needs, taking into account the working environment. The concept can be modified to handle all types of point extraction. The prototype had been tested at the project partner Novenco Building to test whether the system can work in practice.
A concept and a prototype have also been developed for measuring equipment for simultaneous registration of pressure, flow, power consumption, etc. for process ventilation systems. The purpose of the measuring equipment is to obtain knowledge about the actual operation of process ventilation systems with the aim of being able to identify possible efficiency measures for existing installations, and to create the right basis for rich sizing of future ventilation systems. The measuring equipment has been tested at a process extraction plant at the furniture company Tvilum.
In addition, a design tool has been developed that supports the companies, their suppliers and consultants when new process ventilation systems are to be designed or when existing process ventilation systems are to be renovated so that they are optimal in the individual case.
Studies have been carried out on the possibilities of increasing the use of recirculation of process air, partly during ongoing discussions with the Danish Working Environment Authority and during discussions with the project partner Camfil and other stakeholders in the industry.
The developed concept for process extraction, - based on a welding extraction, has shown that it is possible to reduce the amount of extracted air in a point extraction very significantly while at the same time ensuring the working environment and in many cases improving it. It is estimated that the air volumes in point extraction can be reduced by an average of at least 15% by using the developed technology, where the greatest potentials are found in unregulated, manually operated point extraction, and the smallest potentials in automatically controlled point extraction connected to machinery.
In addition, a measurement concept has been developed that can be used for identification of energy efficiency possibilities and right sizing of process ventilation systems. It is estimated that the air volumes in process ventilation systems can be reduced by 10-15% on average by realizing the possibilities identified by using the measuring equipment.
The total electricity and heat consumption for process ventilation is estimated at approx. 800 GWh/year and 10,000 GWh/year. It can be calculated that the electricity and heat consumption as a whole can be reduced by up to approx. 50% and 30% if the above-mentioned potentials are used. This corresponds to approx. 400 GWh electricity and 3,000 GWh heat annually.
Both the concept of adaptive control of point extraction and of the measuring equipment have been brought to the prototype level and are ready for commercialization by a manufacturer. At the meeting held at the end of the project, there was particular interest in the adaptive control of process extraction. The meeting participants thought that it was obvious for Danish manufacturers of extraction systems to implement the concept in their products, and encouraged the project participants to discuss this with Geovent and similar Danish manufacturers.
The project is financed by the ELFORSK program with project No. 352-033 and was carried out in the period 1 April 2020 to mid-May 2022.
Key figures
Category
Participants
| Partner | Subsidy | Auto financing |
|---|---|---|
| VELTEK | ||
| Brancheforening FAV | ||
| AURA Rådgivning A/S |
