IMServ, one of the UK’s leading Energy Data Collection and Meter Operations service providers, has brought sustainable benefits and cost savings to PD Ports with automatic meter reading.
PD Ports in Middlesbrough employed IMServ to provide automatic measuring and monitoring of energy data from 15 electricity substations and switch rooms of its 779 acre Teesport estate.
IMServ installed 19 MID-approved (Measuring Instrument Directive) sub-meters and provided online access to the half-hourly data from these meters through the cloud-based software analytics platform Resource Advisor.
Justin Vroone, Commercial Director at IMServ, explains: “IMServ’s energy data collection services have provided valuable insights for PD Ports on consumption patterns, time of use data, profiling of energy consumption and generation identification.
“PD Ports can now use the metering data to consider altering operations around time of use tariffs and also use the data as evidence for FiT (Feed in Tariff) payments.”
The project delivered immediate results, including the removal of the labour and transport costs of collecting the meter reads. A major benefit was the identification of their ship-to-shore cranes generating electricity which was being consumed elsewhere onsite.
The resulting data visibility these sub-meters generated brought immediate results for PD Ports, enabling them to:
- accurately distribute and allocate the consumption information and costs across the site
- identify and quantify generated electricity from onsite equipment which was previously not fully understood
The sub-metering data provided:
- individual ship-to-shore crane energy performance and operational analysis through the energy profiles
- analysis to optimise existing opportunity for energy generation and energy savings without altering operational processes therefore saving electricity and demands on the grid with minimum cost to the business
Darren Coleman, Electrical Project Engineer at PD Ports, commented: “This project required a great deal of planning, coordination, flexibility, knowledge and experience both from the office staff and the installation team. IMServ was able to work in collaboration with PD Ports to accomplish this professionally, with diligence and a first-rate regard to health and safety.”
Justin continues: “The identification of this electricity generation was not only a welcome result for PD Ports but, the metering data discovered this generation at 11% of the energy consumed. To quantify this, in a sample week the three cranes consumed 22,600kWh with 2,520kWh being generated. This generation when fully harnessed could provide a net benefit for Teesport for the full year via a reduction in grid supply of around 131,000kWh, of circa £19,000 and 52TCo2.”
IMServ predicts that there is a potential of 11.7MWh of energy generated each year that is not being harnessed from port crane operations. Should all UK container port’s replicate this project, coupled with new crane technology, they could generate reduce demand on the grid by £1.7million and avoid 4,500 TCo2 annually. A substantial benefit to the UK’s ports and a substantial realised reduction in demand from the National Grid.
