The ENERGY-SMARTOPS project is funded from the Marie Curie FP7 ITN (Initial Training Networks) scheme. It ran from 1 Feb 2011 to 31 Jan 2015.

ENERGY-SMARTOPS is addressing the integrated control and operation of processes, rotating machinery and electrical equipment to achieve energy savings.

It involves end-user companies (BASF, Acciai Speciali Terni, Statoil), companies that supply technology and training (ABB R&D in Norway, Poland and Germany, ESD Ltd), and universities (Imperial College, Cranfield, ETH Zurich, Politechnika Krakowska, Carnegie Mellon).

The consortium has experts in electrical machinery and power electronics, compressors and pumps, modelling and optimization, instrumentation, signal analysis, equipment condition monitoring, and automation of oil & gas, steel and chemical processes.

Scientific and technical objectives for the project

The overall scientific and technical aim of ENERGY-SMARTOPS is to generate and test creative ideas for energy savings in large scale industrial sites that will be tested in case studies. The steps are:

  1. To develop scalable and complete equipment monitoring systems integrating multiple measurements from the process, mechanical and electrical sub-systems.
  2. To do performance monitoring and control by capturing information from all three subsystems, and devising new algorithms that explicitly manage the interfaces and interactions between them.
  3. To study ways that energy savings can be achieved through optimization and better integration of operations across the process-mechanical-electrical interfaces.

ENERGY SMARTOPS has trained a cohort of early stage researchers in the above areas in a variety of ways including doctoral studies towards a PhD, industrial training, and short courses.

 

courtesy of ESD Training Simulation Ltd