The ‘Business side of Green’

14 February 2011

SPONSORED ARTICLE: The feed-back from our first article in the December issue created such a great response that I have decided to continue through this year giving a ‘travels with Aunt Rosie’ type of approach to the never ending research we put in to our solution designs.

Our research is always varied and far reaching as we like to review the full impact of industry, waste, energy consumption, carbon arising areas to name but a few. Efficient use of earth resources is essential to maintaining a sustainable future; let’s face it we can’t just stop!
COAL Services deliver intelligent and integrated energy and building solutions, our model is based on a continual ‘quest to be best’. I like to challenge the perceived understanding and head-line messages being purveyed and look under the skin to ensure that what we recommend is not just rhetoric.
There have been several announcements recently by manufacturers of electric vehicles attempting the British Land Speed Record set by Don Wales Bluebird in the nineties. I was involved in Don’s record breaking then and am glad that he has announced his intention to defend and improve upon it with new technology. When Don first set the record electric cars were not fashionable and thus support and interest was always so hard to find, today it’s a different matter as electric cars and hybrids are developed globally. It is however worth considering the carbon foot print and carbon impact of electric and cars, they are obviously seen as favourable due to the lack of localised emissions and the low cost of re-charge. However the carbon emissions of an electric car come through manufacturing, charging and disposal. The carbon deposit costs of charging are concentrated to the energy production source or should we say power station. The energy efficiency of electric car’s, is as yet, far behind that of petrol/diesel
engines that are being continually developed and designed to burn greener and more efficiently. This efficient use of carbon resources is essential, stretching the end game on carbon fuels is so important as we are a few decades away from finding a real replacement.... All the same.....Good luck Don of increasing the record and maintaining your rightful position as the holder. I will be there supporting this fantastic and very British endeavour.
I visited a WEEE recycling plant this week to ensure that our downstream ISO14001 compliance is as it should be. What I found was that our supplier is continually assessing ways of increasing the re-usable output and increasing the efficiency of the plant, a big tick in the box...well done Rob and SWEEEP. The SWEEEP visit also coincides with a project we are working on reviewing the technologies used to manage SWM (solid waste mass). The current trend is for separation at the household and then transporting the variable recyclables to differing sites entails a considerable increase in manual labour and an increase in the wastes carbon footprint. SWM is generally on a different site to one that processed metals etc etc. There must surely be a way to bring this together is our thought. And it is. We are working with a company that has developed a fantastic approach to the problem, not all of it is new but the approach is unique.
The end result is an environmentally green and self sufficient process that develops enough energy via bio-ethanol to power itself whilst using the solid waste as a consumable to fuel a part of the process. The offering is also selffinancing and no prior separation (other than electrics and metals) is required. Sounds like utopias and it also looks it....if you want more information on this please e-mail.
Our recent seminar on green energy and the ‘business side of green’ has also generated significant interest and work streams. The seminar was held at a client site that had just
had one of our recommended supplier/partners voltage optimisation platform installed and we can confirm that the client is enjoying an 11% reduction in energy usage. This is a huge financial incentive and a major part of CRC compliance. Interesting this was installed at a new building that had led lights and various other energy saving products installed. Please e-mail for more information and a site audit to demonstrate the benefits to you.
Three of the main products that our clients are having installed are described below, for some of you this will be information you don’t need, for others hopefully it is enlightening:
Air Source Heat Pumps
Air Sourced heat pumps provide hot water for heating, hot water for washing and if required chilled cold water for cooling individually but NOT simultaneously. Why? ASHP systems are classed as a renewable green energy by the government. These systems provide heating, hot water and cold water at a minimum of three times the efficiency than the most efficient gas boiler available to buy. Therefore energy costs and bills are seriously reduced. Hot water can be used in the building for either washing or hot water heating systems and stored in tanks as a conventional gas boiler system would. The heat pump needs to be located “externally” to the building and uses the ambient air energy to either heat to your hot water or heating water.
This process / cycle can be reversed so as to provide chilled water for cooling the building and expelling the heat to the air .However the ASHP has fans to move air across heating & cooling coils and therefore noise is a consideration as well as physical location and visible effect. The government has provided a scheme that provides the ASHP system owner with “cash back” for generating heating at such efficient levels the scheme is known as the Renewable Heat Incentive ( RHI ). The basis of the scheme is that for every Kwhr the ASHP installation generates the utility supplier will provide cash back to the owner. Values are dependent on the size of the ASHP system. Planning permission may be required.
Ground Source Heat Pumps
Heat pumps provide hot water for heating, hot water for washing and if required chilled cold water for cooling either individually or all at the same time simultaneously. Why? GSHP systems are classed as a renewable green energy by the government. These systems provide heating, hot water and cold water at a minimum of four times the efficiency than the most efficient gas boiler available to buy.
Therefore energy costs and bills are seriously reduced. Hot water can be used in the building for either washing or hot water heating systems and stored in tanks as a conventional gas boiler system would. The heat pump located in the building is connected to underground tubes that absorb the earth’s underground heat and then delivers that energy / heat to your hot water or heating water. This process / cycle can be reversed so as to provide chilled water for cooling the building and dumping the heat underground via the same tubes. The underground tube systems can be installed horizontally in excavated trenches or inserted in drilled bore holes vertically but this is very dependent on local geology and the area available. No planning permission is required as the system is not visible as all installed underground .No noise issues from any fans - “Once installed – Never to be seen again”. The government has provided a scheme that provides the GSHP system owner with “cash back” for generating heating at such efficient levels the scheme is known as the Renewable Heat Incentive ( RHI ).
The basis of the scheme is that for every Kwhr the GSHP installation generates the utility supplier will provide cash back to the owner. Values are dependent on the size of the GSHP system. Planning permission is not required.
Solar Thermal Energy
Solar Thermal panels/tubes absorb the suns solar rays (Heat) and transfer it to water circulating through the panel and the hot water can be used in the building for either washing or hot water heating systems and stored in tanks as a conventional gas boiler system would. Why Solar Thermal? Again, it’s classed as a renewable green energy by the government. These systems provide heating and hot water at an extremely high efficiency level as there is no gas input required to obtain hot water. Therefore energy costs and bills are seriously reduced There are two systems
● Flat Panel
● Vacuum Tube
The Solar Vacuum Tube System has a higher energy efficiency level than the flat panel design and is far more flexible with regards to installation locations and Panels are generally mounted on roof areas where little or no sun shading occurs but can be located at ground level on walls or any area that is generally facing south and has sunlight. Planning permission may be required.
● Laurence Burton is head of operations at COAL IT. Contact; green@coalit.com