Glass Industry News

Glass manufacturer introduces energy management

, Siemens AG

Reducing carbon emissions by 50% and energy use by 20% by 2030 are the company’s current sustainability goals. Simatic Energy Manager PRO (Simatic EnMPRO) system and the SiGREEN approach form the centerpiece of their holistic optimization efforts.

The delicate balance between ecologic and economic interests

“If you want to survive on the market, you have to demonstrably improve your environmental performance,” says Georg Feith, CEO of the Stoelzle Glass Group. Getting greener is quite a feat, particularly for a high-end glass container manufacturer whose output totals 3.8 billion units every year. “Everyone knows that the whole industry wants to reduce its energy costs sooner rather than later. They used to make up about 10 percent of our operating costs, but in the current situation they’re up to 30 percent,” he explains.

To improve energy efficiency and reduce costs, Stoelzle needed to identify inefficiencies and deviations early on as well as track and evaluate trends and changes in energy consumption. “We recognized early on that we needed an energy management system at the group level,” says Alexander Roschitz, group manager, Stoelzle Group. There were metering points, but not enough, and none that were interconnected – neither in the individual factories nor across factories. There were no standardized KPIs, nor could they be automatically calculated,” he continues. Values from Excel spreadsheets were used to draw conclusions. 

Getting the true carbon footprint with data and KPIs

At the start of 2020, Stoelzle Glass brought Siemens on board to consult. The two companies closely worked together to identify energy-efficient and carbon-related KPIs, develop a viable metering concept, and focus on the most relevant potential savings.

According to Alexander Roschitz, Stoelzle realized it needed “a software that could be used group-wide for acquiring, recording, and evaluating data and for visualizing it in a variety of ways.” The company wanted a system that can give full transparency of energy use at all levels, from the group to the factory to the plant to the line. To prove and document regulatory compliance, they needed high-quality valid data with standardized KPIs. These multifaceted requirements were best by Siemens’ Simatic EnMPRO energy management system. With it, Stoelzle can easily evaluate energy and CO2 KPIs, calculate the energy balance, track all measures, and report results.

Another important part of the decarbonization effort is the reporting of greenhouse gas emissions within the scopes as defined by the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. SiGREEN, an application also developed by Siemens, efficiently collates real data collected from where emissions are actually produced. With SiGREEN, Stoelzle can exchange emission data along the supply chain and combine it with data from its own value creation to obtain a product’s true carbon footprint. Stoelzle’s CEO was impressed. “Future requirements are going to be increasingly complex and interconnected, and the solutions are already available today,” comments Georg Feith.  

 

International rollout 

First to undergo the optimization in 2021 was the production site at the Köflach headquarters. 70 new metering points for gas, electricity, compressed air, and water were added, and 1,800 data points from process and production systems were integrated. Results were encouraging. Monitoring reveals that municipal water use can be reduced by 50%, and that better temperature control help the generators use 20% less natural gas. By the end of 2022, all seven Stoelzle factories in Europe will be fully connected to the system. The U.S. site will follow in 2023.

“We made the right choice with Siemens. We’re now looking forward to the international rollout and other collaborative steps that will make Stoelzle a glass manufacturer that’s successful on the market while being verifiably energy-efficient with demonstrably low emissions,” concludes Georg Feith.

As evidenced by Stoelzle Glass Group’s extended history, sustainability was always part of the firm’s vocabulary. Taking these steps to firmly embed sustainability into its operations will ensure that both the environment and the company can enjoy a long and prosperous future.

, © Siemens AG

News material on the Site is copyright and belongs to the Company or to its third party news provider, and all rights are reserved. Any User who accesses such material may do so only for its own personal use, and the use of such material is at the sole risk of the User. Redistribution or other commercial exploitation of such news material is expressly prohibited. Where such news material is provided by a third party, each User agrees to observe and be bound by the specific terms of use applying to such news material. We do not represent or endorse the accuracy or reliability of any of the info contained in any news or external websites referred to in the news.

Should the content or the design of these sites violate third parties rights or legal prescriptions, we kindly ask you to send us a respective message without invoice or cost. We guarantee that passages where the claim is considered as justified will be removed immediately, without any necessity to involve any lawyer into this issue. We will reject any claim caused by submission of a honorary note in this regard without any prior contact and confirmation of the issueby us and we reserve the right ssue counter claim ourselves because of violation of aforesaid conditions.



Info Grid

Glass studies

Updated worldwide glass study 2024

plants.glassglobal.com

Updated hollow glass study 2024

Request more information

Updated float glass study 2024

Request more information

Further glass market studies

Request more information

Company Profile



Updated worldwide glass market study 2024 available now for flat, container glass and tableware

We have updated our international studies on flat glass, container glass and tableware for 2024.

This unique software provides a global overview about glass producers and technical details. Easy to use and clear tables summarize information and data about glass makers such as: Glass types: flat glass, container glass, tableware, production capacities in regions and countries, number of furnaces, furnace types, year of construction, glass types and sub-types, products, project information, special news and downloads.

Further databases supplying demoscopic data and import and export data complete the market survey. Based on these data, prepare individual country profiles with information about local production capacities, local market sizes and expected demand in the future.

Request your offer via plants.glassglobal.com.

Updated container glass study 2024

X

Updated float glass study 2024

X

Further glass studies and reports 2024

X