Kingspan continues sustainability drive
Kingspan Insulation has demonstrated its commitment to improving the sustainability of its manufacturing operations with the installation of one of the largest roof-top solar PV arrays in the UK at its factory in Pembridge. 5583 m2 of roof is now covered by the Kingspan Roof PowerPanel System supplied by sister company Kingspan Insulated Panels. Its design capacity is 800 kW, and it will supply electricity for the site’s manufacturing lines and lighting.
This installation of solar PV follows the retrofit installation of rooflights to reduce the need for electric lighting, improving the efficiency of the remaining luminaires and installing intelligent controls to reduce demand.
Electric motors on manufacturing lines have been replaced with energy-efficient variable-speed drives.
Compressors have been replaced with more efficient models, and improved controls have been installed on the extract system and compressors — two of the main energy loads on the site.
Gas-fired CHP was installed in 2008 to meet part of the base electrical demand of the site and supply heat for production processes, but the company still used significant amounts of electricity from the grid.
Spencer Murtagh, operations director at Kingspan Insulation comments; ‘The operations process will benefit from the installation of these PV panels. We had already made the production process and our lighting systems as efficient as possible, so this was the next logical step to reduce our demand from the National Grid.’
Kingspan Insulation monitors energy consumption throughout the site with gas and electricity meters and sub-metering of consumption in production areas. This monitoring will provide useful information about the effectiveness of the PV array.
