Energy efficiency takes a major step forward

Saving energy is not only an important contribution for protecting the environment, but it can also be measured financially. In many industries, such as the automotive, food and beverage industries, airport logistics or general transport logistics, the topic ‘Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)’ is becoming increasingly important. Already in the planning stage, energy efficiency has become a focal point of integrated approaches. This inevitably affects the development of modern drive technology as well, because the drive components used and their overall efficiency play a major role in this. Electrically powered systems typically account for more than two thirds of the industrial power consumption.

A simple equation illustrates this:

PInput = POutput + PLosses

This means that the costs for electrical energy input PInput are calculated from the effectively needed mechanical energy POutput plus losses PLosses resulting from the overall efficiency

Irrespective of the type of application or system, energy costs can only be reduced if energy losses during plant operation are kept as low as possible.

This is why more and more system operators invest in the latest development from SEW-EURODRIVE. For them, the mechatronic drive system MOVIGEAR is not only an investment in future oriented and intelligent drive technology, but it also helps them to reduce energy costs immediately.

Take the motor efficiency of MOVIGEAR, for example, which already today exceeds efficiency class IE4, which is currently being discussed as a draft in the IEC. The overall efficiency of MOVIGEAR, of gear unit, motor and drive electronics, is thus considerably greater than that of conventional drive solutions, contributing substantially to the reduction of energy losses during system operation.

The mechatronic drive system MOVIGEAR achieves such a high total efficiency due to:

• Optimized interfaces between motor and gear unit.

• New motor concepts.

• New electronic components and intelligent control modes.

The higher costs, compared to conventional drive solutions, are compensated within only one or two years by the saved energy costs.

Minimising drive losses

A current calculation example from a large bottling plant shows that the total efficiency of a drive solution with MOVIGEAR is between 10 and up to 25 percentage points higher than that of conventional drive solutions, depending on the used gear unit type and the operating point. If the 105 frequency controlled standard gearmotors in this application, with a power rating between 1.1 and 2.2 kW, were replaced by corresponding MOVIGEAR units, the energy costs could be reduced by between 15 and 30% on average.

Using MOVIGEAR is not only an active contribution to preserving resources and the environment, but also enables the system operator to save a substantial amount of costs.

Further energy saving aspects:

• The energy efficiency of MOVIGEAR makes a sustainable contribution to the reduction of CO2 emissions and thus actively protects the environment.

• MOVIGEAR significantly reduces the reactive power consumption compared to motors operated directly on the mains supply and thus helps to ensure that reactive power limit values are observed.