BYD
At a Glance
Industry
Industrial Goods and Manufacturing
Project Type
Industrial Energy Efficiency
Year
2019
Location
Shenzhen
Summary
Lin Chen helped BYD identify energy efficiency solutions in one of the company's IT manufacturing facilities.
Goals
BYD, a leading Chinese high-tech manufacturing company for clean energy solutions and electronic production, has the assertion to further reduce energy consumption and GHG emissions from its own manufacturing activities. In order to build more energy-efficient factories and improve its workers working environment, the company listed Lin Chen as one of the EDF Climate Corps BYD fellows in 2019 to find solutions in one of its IT manufacturing facilities in Shenzhen.
Solutions
After collecting and analyzing energy data from multiple facilities in the plant, Chen found that auxiliary equipment and compressed air system are the most energy-intensive components in the plant, even exceeding the injection molding machines, which are the key production equipment there. Due to the lack of maintenance of the compressed air system for a long time, the leakage of the system was severe causing big noise and significant energy waste. In addition, by meticulously measuring and calculating the energy input/output data onsite, Chen identified the heating equipment as the most impactful component on energy- and environmental-performance of the plant. Chen identified the AC system and heating equipment insulation as the most impactful and cost-effective areas and provided his strategic solutions to improve, because the improvements in these areas could not only significantly save energy, but also effectively improve the working environmental for the workers, which simultaneously improves productivities and save money. Chen also provided other suggestions to the factory to better manage energy and save money, including lighting upgrade, employee engagement and training on energy efficiency, and data measuring and verification improvement.
Potential Impact
When Lin's proposed projects are fully implemented, the entire plant can reduce electricity consumption by 1,858,642 kWh per year, saving around $500,000 in energy cost and avoiding 1,731.47 tons of CO2 emissions annually as well. At the end of his fellowship, the compressed air management process developed by Chen and his BYD supervisor was under the internal discussion of the factory for implementation approval, and the insulation design of heating equipment was under internal evaluation for implementation as well.