Advanced Energy Provides Motor Services to New York City's 1st Rochdale

July 11, 2000

Teaming with TSE Services out of North Carolina, Advanced Energy worked with 1st Rochdale Cooperative NYC to provide unique motor management services to Amalgamated Housing Cooperative, one of Rochdale's larger members. Applying expertise in motors normally used with industrial customers, Advanced Energy zoomed in on an area ripe with potential for energy efficiency improvements.

TSE, the service company branch of North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation, was preparing a diverse service package for 1st Rochdale to supply to its client, a pilot test for this sort of arrangement. Assisting TSE, Advanced Energy went along for the ride to a meeting of the minds between TSE, Amalgamated, and 1st Rochdale officials to identify specific needs to be addressed.

Amalgamated's dozen or so buildings range in age from 20 to 70 years, and in size from several two-to-five story structures to two high-rise towers. While TSE worked out plans to replace an old chiller, the Advanced Energy team initiated a hands-on, exploratory expedition into some of the buildings' facilities.

Into the sub-basement bowels of the buildings' central heating plant they went. Descending a long spiral staircase, the group made it's way to the plant's central core. There stood the main boiler, 30 feet square and 60 feet high. All about, the team saw motors, laboring hard. Many had lived well past their prime. One pumped the heavy, viscous fuel powering the boiler's flame-fired heart. Attached to its back was an old fan pulled from the trash. An idea was growing of what Advanced Energy could do.

Ascending briefly back into the world of the sun, the team moved on to the basement of one of high-rises. Again, they saw motors struggling to survive. There were box fans blowing on motors, stalling potential heat exhaustion and collapse. Many of the motors' bearings had been replaced and replaced. The team then realized how they could come through.

Advanced Energy proposed a plan for a motor survey in all of the buildings and for the development of a motor management policy for Amalgamated that would offer significant long-term energy savings and increase the overall reliability of the motors in use. Sixteen motors were identified for immediate, outright replacement with new, energy efficient motors. A local contractor was trained to conduct the nameplate data collection and diagnostic testing essential to the motor survey.

A total of 176 motors were surveyed. Of these, the 89 largest were considered in an Advanced Energy spreadsheet analysis of costs and paybacks relative to motor repair/replacement decisions. Calculations were performed for using either the average or best energy efficient motor available as a replacement, both outright and at the time of failure.

"In almost all cases, the economics are better if the best available energy efficient motor is chosen as a replacement," says Bob Zickefoose, senior motor systems engineer for Advanced Energy. "The cost of purchasing an extra point of efficiency is smaller than the savings which result from the purchase."

For Amalgamated, the average payback time for replacement of these motors at the time of failure was 2 years. In some cases, payback time reached zero, meaning that it would cost more to repair certain motors than to have them replaced. In addition, the projected energy savings resulting from using this approach reached about 61562 kWh per year.

To achieve both long-term energy savings and favorable paybacks on new motor investment, Advanced Energy recommended that Amalgamated go with the highest energy efficient models available for both outright replacements and replacements in the future at the time of failure. In addition, a system for tagging motors with correct replacement information was laid out to expedite motor management.

Amalgamated has already made a first round of new motor purchases based on Advanced Energy's recommendations.

"Advanced Energy opened our eyes to a cost factor we'd never thought about," says Ed Yaker, president and resident of Amalgamated and treasurer on the board of 1st Rochdale.

"In the past, the motors would break, and we'd repair them," says Yaker. "Advanced Energy educated us on ways to save money through an improved motor policy. The savings we'll achieve in reduced consumption totally outweighs the initial capital cost."

"This type of approach is critical to our ability to help our customers achieve their goals in an energy restructured marketplace," says Tom Thompson, vice-president of sustainable energy for 1st Rochdale. "We want to help maximize the value our customers get for each unit of energy used."

For more information on how Advanced Energy services can work for you, please contact Kitt Butler at (919) 857-9017 or kbutler@advancedenergy.org .