Energy is a significant cost to your business, so more and more companies are looking towards ways to save money and increase efficiency. A typical pneumatic solenoid valve of bygone eras may have consumed 60 times more energy with a fraction of the lifespan of modern, efficient valves. Taking a look at advancements in valve technology provides insight into how this is possible, and how this can help you save energy and lower operating costs.
Modern Valve Design
One technique that dramatically lowered the energy consumption of a pneumatic valve was using the concept of flow amplification and using smaller solenoid valves to operate much larger air-operated valves. The solenoid pilot valves have undergone specific design changes to improve their performance and use less energy. As valve design evolved, materials changed to lower the overall mass and improve efficiency of the valve, while simultaneously redesigning internal passages, spool and sleeves, and poppet designs changed to increase flow capacity.
As industrial automation produces ever more sophisticated machines with the advance of robotics, benefits of weight reduction and power conservation in pneumatic valve design are beginning to find their role in a larger strategy of environmental technology.
Optimizing solenoid valve-design may seem like a small matter on the scale of energy consumption in the modern world, but every unnecessary ounce of material and unit of energy expended have a collective and negative impact. The vast majority of energy used to manufacture and operate virtually every modern object we use every day is electricity generated from coal, which is a non-renewable fossil fuel.
Practical Techniques for Energy Savings
- Utilize Energy-Efficient Pneumatic Valves Whenever Possible
- The replacement of old energy-inefficient pneumatic valves can be done as part of a major overhaul or simply as a replace-as-needed strategy. Check the power consumption of any product you have in service and ask if there is another way of doing the same job with less energy.
- Utilize Energy-Efficient Machines
- Scope out power consumption statistics for any new piece of equipment your company is looking to use and speak with the builders about what information they may have. Does this new piece of equipment meet your company’s standard? If not, what other options are available?
- Use the Correct Amount of Air Pressure
- Pressure is energy and energy is cost. Using more energy than required for a given actuator adds up over time.
- Power Off Equipment When Not In Use
- Why supply energy to a piece of equipment that is not in use? Energy is still consumed or lost, even when not in use unless the shut-off valve is completely off.
For help finding the energy savings in your operation, let the experts at SMC do an Air Leak Detection Audit at your facility.
Information provided with the knowledge of SMC Pneumatics.