Challenge:
A university uses steam to heat the buildings on their campuses. The three campuses occupy 5000 acres. They are composed of classrooms, residences, study areas, libraries, laboratories, restaurants, gyms and much more. In order to service the spaces, they have power plants which supply steam and pump it through miles and miles of pipes through underground tunnels. They have thousands of steam traps in order to eliminate condensate and keep system running safely and powerfully. Steam trap audits are performed on a regular basis, but due to the complicated system, are expensive, take a tremendous amount of time and can even be dangerous.
The task of auditing traps was massive..
Solution:
The facility management proposed systematic Pulse sensor rollouts over the next several years, starting with their most critical traps and adding more every quarter until all are being monitored.
“Steam is a green choice for heat, and monitoring makes it more cost effective than ever”
Benefits:
The cost of having Pulse monitors on all their traps is extremely insignificant when weighed against the money lost through steam and energy loss from failures
Manual audits are less accurate than sensors due to human error, plus they look at data over a period of a few minutes a year as opposed to thousands of readings per year
The University used this project as part of their sustainability initiatives, positioning them as thought leaders in the environmental space which has been found to be a key consideration for enrollment criteria
When a steam trap fails an email alert is sent to the facility manager who can arrange for repairs at an optimal time
