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Europe's leader in second-life household disposables, CeDo, has just completed a programme of energy saving measures that are set to save the company some 10% in energy costs at its Telford manufacturing site.
CeDo is one of Europe's leading recyclers of agricultural film, collecting silage waste from the UK, Ireland and Continental Europe and recycling the film at the companies recently upgraded facility in Geleen, The Netherlands. In 2007 some 40,000 tonnes of film was recycled in this way with some 22,000 tonnes of film recovered for use in the refuse sack sector. The collection and recycling system now has full lot traceability to EN15343 standard, which CeDo are currently the only recycling plant to have attained this European Norm.
CeDo Telford is one of the largest film blowing operations in the UK: The company deploys a total of 43 film extrusion machines and each one has been subject to an intensive review of its energy consumption and performance.
CeDo’s new Group Chief Executive, David Pearce says that ‘energy-saving is a routine part of our performance now across the CeDo Group. Not only is it good for the environment we also need it for the bottom line. The measures which have been successfully modelled and implemented in Telford will now be available for use in other CeDo manufacturing sites across the world. It will be a part of my remit to assess where this work will how happen next.’
CeDo Telford first made an ‘energy map’ of its business activities and identified the main areas of energy consumption. Firstly, attention was paid to the incoming materials used in processing. Utilisation of lower energy materials enabled CeDo to reduce the corresponding processing cost. Lower energy calcium carbonate materials feature strongly in CeDo's EcoMin range of bin liners, David Brookes Technical Manager says "calcium carbonate has a thermal conductivity five times greater than the polyethylene CeDo displaces, similarly the calcium carbonate doesn't melt at polyethylene processing temperatures, these two factors have been found to reduce the processing energy/T of product produced by up to 10%".
Paul Merricks, CeDo Telford Project Coordinator says that ‘these alternate materials, such as chalk additives for polymers, allowed us to run our machines at a slow speed but whilst maintaining outputs. Slower running naturally consumes less energy.’
CeDo Telford also paid a good deal of attention to motor selection which, says Merricks, ‘is a critical part in any energy reduction programme. On our extruders, for example, we are currently trialling state of the art drive systems which deliver both an energy saving and a maintenance saving.
CeDo Telford’s film conversion equipment have also been retrofitted with the latest high efficiency drive motors in order to deliver a further energy saving and a similar approach has been taken with the company’s chillers, compressors and gas supply. Merricks says that ‘we have reduced the amount of compressed air operated equipment, reduced the size of the system and also perform regular air leak audits. We have also installed high efficiency chillers to reduce chilled water energy demands.
Water-usage has also come under the CeDo Telford spotlight. By experimenting with various elements of process control we have been able to significantly increase the operating temperature of our water supply within the factory yielding additional savings from reduced levels of cooling required. Lighting at CeDo Telford has also been reviewed, maximisation of ambient light, use of energy efficient lighting and the installation of mix and match controllers optimises the required lighting.
CeDo is targeting a saving of some £150,000 per year based on the energy saving measures under way. These savings feature under the continuous improvement framework for operational efficiency of the CeDo UK facility.
For further details of the full CeDo product range and packaging technology, contact Ian Tonks or David Brookes at CeDo Ltd. cedo.com
About the Editor
CeDo is Europe's market leader in household disposables: CeDo employs over 2000 people worldwide.
CeDo supplies a wide range of products in primarily own label but supports retailers and New Product Development with brands such as Nappy Sacks, Landsaver and Poly-Lina. Leading CeDo customers include Sainsbury's, Tesco, Aldi, Lidl, Morrisons, ASDA Wal-Mart, Carrefour and Wilkinson.
The CeDo portfolio includes: bin liners and refuse sacks; food, freezer and sandwich bags; cling films, biodegradable bags; fragrant nappy sacks and pet poop bags, cleaning cloths, aluminium foils and cooking papers.
CeDo operates manufacturing plants in the UK, Poland, Netherlands and China with further sales offices in Germany, Russia and France. All CeDo enterprises, worldwide, are run to strict environmental, social, hygiene and quality codes of practice, all are covered by BRC accreditation and have quality systems in line with ISO 9001 and are compliant with SA8000 and ILO convention.
CeDo’s investment into continuous research generates innovative ideas which are converted into product concepts by specialist teams skilled in material, manufacturing and product design and this ensures that CeDo has a portfolio which fulfils consumer needs in all the markets they serve.
For further details of the full CeDo product range and packaging technology, contact Ian Tonks or David Brookes at CeDo Ltd.
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