Industrial decarbonisation strategies: A path forward for utilities
Image credit: ABB
Embracing industrial decarbonisation strategies is key to navigating the complex landscape of the energy transition, writes Marco Tellarini, Senior Vice-President – EMEA Region, Electrification Service, ABB.
Amid the introduction of the European Union’s Green Deal Industrial Plan and renewed Energy Efficiency Directive, European firms now have to meet higher energy and infrastructure standards while battling greater public scrutiny for their carbon emission records.
At an operational level, firms across the board, especially utilities, face the challenge of maintaining robust, reliable services while transitioning to more sustainable operations.
By adopting a holistic strategy that focuses on modernising assets and leveraging digital technologies, operators can enhance infrastructure resilience, achieve significant cost savings, and significantly reduce their energy and carbon footprint.
Achieving carbon and cost reduction through asset modernisation
One of the greatest opportunities for carbon and cost savings lies in upgrading outdated components. Modernising existing electrical components and equipment to boost their operating efficiency while ensuring they can last longer mitigates the likelihood of failure and reduces the risk of downtime.
Upgrading outdated components can reduce the cost of operating equipment by a third and extend its lifecycle by as much as 30 years. This results in enormous energy savings for businesses.
In fact, 50% of electrical equipment like metal cabinets, steel plates and busbars – products with high carbon footprints – can be used perpetually without being replaced if outdated components such as switchgear and circuit breakers are regularly monitored, maintained, and eventually, upgraded.
Such modernisation efforts can extend the lifespan of the products, reducing capital expenditure and minimizing resource consumption.
As such, by actively seeking out opportunities to retrofit dated components with technological upgrades, utilities can achieve improved grid resilience with greater ease, speed, and environmental performance. The result? A win-win situation, both to one’s bottom line and for the planet.
Bringing a strategic view to data-driven predictive maintenance
Rather than running a piece of equipment to the point of failure, utilities should deploy a proactive, predictive maintenance approach that uses real-time data analytics. This helps to monitor and evaluate when a piece of equipment might need upgrading before it happens, reducing downtime and total cost of ownership. Replacements are therefore only done when they are absolutely necessary which reduces waste.
We see this best among early adopters of the predictive maintenance approach. By replacing older, non-digital circuit breakers with more intelligent breakers, linked up to an advanced monitoring system, some facilities have improved their energy capacity by up to 20% and reduced their operational costs by up to 30%.
Furthermore, this helps utility operators prevent potential hazards before they even arise, enabling them to plan for maintenance, which maximises the equipment’s utility and reduces the carbon emissions associated with making a new component purchase, all while keeping costly downtime to a minimum.
Electric grids, for instance, can become more robust and capable of quicker responses to outages. This can be facilitated by better use of fault detection, isolation and restoration technologies as part of a predictive maintenance strategy.
Embedding resilience for a more confident, greener future
Ultimately, the goal of improving green infrastructure is a whole-of-organisation endeavour, which requires the entire firm to decarbonise. This could mean digitising the firm’s entire assets to create digital twins for remote monitoring, analysis and repair, while also seeking to enhance energy efficiency by ensuring that assets are operating at an optimal level.
Such an industrial decarbonisation strategy benefits firms twofold – it reduces environmental impact while boosting operational resilience. This is especially critical as businesses weigh the pros and cons of transitioning fully to renewable energy sources. Ensuring the reliability of their underlying infrastructure will help to increase the willingness to adopt green technologies.
The way forward
A sustainable, decarbonised future for utilities is not only an environmental imperative but a strategic necessity – one that will ultimately result in operators futureproofing themselves for the long term.
The path to industrial decarbonisation is paved with opportunities for innovation, cost optimisation and enhanced sustainability.
Utility companies that proactively adopt these strategies will not only meet evolving regulatory and societal expectations but also stand to set themselves apart as leaders in a greener economy. The future of utilities lies within the ability to be different – to think long-term, be creative, and come up with holistic solutions that take care of our planet, economy and society.
Discover how ABB Electrification Service can optimise your electrical infrastructure and resource utilisation while reducing your environmental impact.
