Leading washroom hygiene services provider Initial Washrooms Solutions, is reducing energy usage at its Reading production plant by installing Venturi orifice traps from GEM
Reading is one of three new processing plants opened by Initial Washroom Solutions as part of a modernisation plan to improve operational efficiency. The new purpose-built plants, which serve the dual role of Service Centres and processing plants, contain some of the latest environmentally friendly and energy efficient machinery, making them some of the most modern plants of their kind in the UK.
As the plant was opened 13 months ago, GEM engineers were quite surprised to find that the site’s mechanical traps were all still fully operational. However, Senior Engineer Michael Butt had past experience of the failure rate of mechanical traps and was keen to make energy and maintenance savings.
He agreed to monitor the GEM steam traps over an extensive trial period. This was achieved utilising the company’s on-site steam meters that are used to measure the 5-tonne boiler and other steam equipment. One meter in particular is used to measure the amount of steam consumed by Initial’s eight new, water-efficient Revolution processing machines, which use steam to process an average of 80 to 90 towels per hour.
“The steam metering results were crucial in this exercise and confirmed that we are achieving the predicted ten per cent savings in gas consumption and making a 14 per cent reduction in steam”, said Butt. “These savings will provide us with a total payback within 12 months”.
Such has been the success of the traps at the Reading plant that the company has now exchanged the mechanical steam traps in its other two new processing plants in Birmingham and Glasgow to GEM.
“We are also aware that because of the GEM’s Venturi orifice design we will never experience trap failure and the resultant loss of live steam,” said Butt. “I would have no hesitation in recommending GEM to any other organisation utilising steam as a heat transfer fluid."
Instead of utilising a valve mechanism to close off steam, the stainless steel GEM traps use a patented Venturi orifice design to effectively drain condensate from the steam system. As the GEM steam traps have no moving parts to wedge open or fail, it provides the ultimate in reliability necessitating only minimal maintenance and requiring no spares, testing or monitoring equipment.
