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Sustainability

Beldam Crossley

Overview:

Beldam Crossley, a manufacturer of industrial sealing technologies, is saving over £4,400 and 23 tonnes of CO2e a year with resource efficiency support from Green Growth.

 

The Bolton-based manufacturer supplies PTFE industrial sealants to a variety of industry sectors, from aerospace and automotive to marine, defence and power generation.

The company, which employs 83 staff and has a turnover of £6.7 million, takes its name from 19th Century ship designer and engineer, Asplan Beldam, who enabled ships to travel faster by devising a seal to stop steam from escaping.

It holds both the ISO 9001 Quality Management and ISO 14001 Environmental Management standards.

The challenge:

Beldam Crossley started receiving support from Green Growth after being referred by the Manufacturing Advisory Service (now part of the Business Growth Service), which had been helping the company improve its Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system to cope with the challenges of rapid business growth.

The Manufacturing Advisory Service recognised that this growth would also put pressure on energy consumption, so Green Growth was brought in to undertake an on-site resource efficiency audit to help manage resource use.

The solution:

Green Growth identified a number of improvement opportunities – including lighting upgrades, power factor correction and improved compressed air efficiency – and was able to assist in outlining the business case for investment, based on likely cost savings and payback periods.

Lighting

Following Green Growth advice, Beldam Crossley replaced older T12, T8 and 250W high bay lighting with high frequency, energy efficient T5 fluorescents. The new lighting is also controlled by movement and daylight sensors to reduce excess use of light when they are not needed.

These improvements will reduce annual electricity usage by 47,000kWh, resulting in annual cost savings of over £4,400, with a payback period of five years. They will also save an estimated 23 tonnes of CO2e each year.

Other opportunities

By undertaking a compressed air leak detection survey, and energy logging on the incoming electricity supply that identified power factor correction issues, Green Growth also identified other opportunities for future implementation that are estimated to achieve further annual savings of over £8,600 and 25 tonnes CO2e.

In addition, Green Growth was able to help Beldam Crossley to scope for a rooftop solar PV installation on another of its sites.

‘Continual improvement’

Group Engineering Manager at Beldam Crossley, Giuseppe Ponti, said: "Beldam Crossley have long been committed to environmental improvement and all the benefits it brings. The work we're doing with Green Growth fits in well with our key objectives to improve energy efficiency and reduce waste overall."

Claire Scott, Green Growth environmental business advisor, added: “Beldam Crossley has held ISO 14001 certification for some time and it’s nice to work with a company that realises getting outside support can really help with continual improvement and staff engagement.”

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