Variable-speed drives save Bourne Leisure £77 000 a year
One of the UK’s largest operators of holiday parks has reduced energy bills for its swimming pools by £77 000 a year, with a payback of just over a year, by fitting ABB drives to pumps. Bourne Leisure owns brands such as Haven, Butlins and Warner Hotels and has swimming pools at a number of sites.
APDS, an ABB Drives alliance partner, carried out a trial with two of the three filtration pumps at the Devon Cliffs site. The pump was monitored for a period before a temporary variable-speed drive was installed. An average current of 30 A was reduced to 23 A during the day and 15 A at night, with no effect on water quality.
APDS and ABB recommended fitting variable-speed drives to the pumps feeding the pool filters. Pumping water at reduced flow improves filtration and removes more contaminants. The traditional method achieves this by increasing the diameter of the feed pipe and using a control valve to limit flow — while still running the pump at full speed.
Doug Pitts of APDS says, ‘The trial showed the predicted saving for each 18.5 kW pump at Devon Cliffs was £4899 a year, giving a payback period of under six months. The actual savings exceeded those predicted in the energy report as the motor speed could be accurately mapped to pool utilisation.’
Drives ranging from 3.3 to 30 kW were eventually installed in 36 pools around the country — achieving savings of up to £11 000 a year, depending on the size of the pool.
Craig Valentine, health and safety manager for Bourne Leisure, explains, ‘The conversion only takes a day, with most of the rewiring done at night, so there has been very little disruption for our guests.’
