EFFICIENT PRODUCTION Transitioning to improved water use and resource efficiency The NCPC-SA has published a guideline to assist the agri-processing sector to efficiently monitor its processes. The goals are increased efficiency and reduced costs. Monitoring can improve water efficiency. The Metering and Monitoring Guideline produced by the National Cleaner Production Centre of South Africa (NCPC-SA) is intended for the agri-processing sector to assist agricultural-processing companies to transition to better water- and resource-efficiency practices and help mitigate water-supply risks in the sector. The NCPC-SA’s Industrial Water Efficiency Project promotes the transformation of industrial-water-use practices in South Africa to reduce water consumption and to improve industrialwater-effluent quality. The business case is evident: South Africa’s population has grown but the resource and capacity requirements to sustain the growth have not kept up, resulting in supply constraints which inevitably impact on cost, availability and the risk of interrupted supply. The electrical energy cost escalations and interrupted supply is a point in case. The constraints on the capacity of supply and water-treatment infrastructure continue to increase and so similar cost dynamics are being realised with water and effluent municipal services. South African companies in the agri-processing sector range from companies whose only metering data are derived from monthly utility bills (often estimated by the local council) to those companies that have hundreds of metering points in the plant measuring at one-second intervals. In general, South African companies have limited sub-metering systems in place and most rely on intensity targets (kWh or litre-per-kg production) to determine performance. With few exceptions, companies that have world-class resource management systems have invested heavily in metering and measurement systems to drive efficiencies. These companies will typically target projects with a two-to-three-year payback period and utilise the data from the metering systems to motivate for additional budget and approval of CAPEX. The guideline authors explain, “We wrote this guide with a couple of people in mind. Firstly, the person who gets delegated the job of putting a metering programme in place might be the engineer. He is interested in costs and knows what is in the plant, but he knows nothing about management systems. The meters will therefore be put up and data will be collected but nothing will happen with the data. It is important to think about what you are going to use the data for, and how it will inform decision-making. “Therefore, the second person we wrote the guide for is the environmental manager or the person who is given that responsibility. Often, it's a shared role and that person knows nothing about equipment, knows nothing about contractors, knows nothing about maintenance. So we wanted to write a manual that appeals firstly to the person who understands management systems and it contains enough information for them to put a budget together and hand it down to a contractor and say, ‘This is where I want metering points and this is the type of metering I want’.” The guideline is structured from a management-system point of view and as such, has a circular way of looking at things. It also follows the structure of an energy-management system. It starts with identifying the need; developing a metering plan which also discusses setting objectives, determining key performance indicators, identifying measuring points and defining the approach; selecting the meter, data storage and usage; determining the budget; installation; and analysis and interpretation. The 64-page guide includes practical examples and case studies. It covers: • Metering planning, including how to set objectives and targets and how to align the measurement approach accordingly. • Metering technologies and strategies, reviewing the different types of meters and their applications in the areas of water, water and effluent discharge quality, steam and electrical. • Metering communications and storage, reviewing the common strategies for collecting data as well as ensuring that the database is properly compiled to allow for easy analyses. • Metering costs and financing options, providing enough information to compile a capital budget for the procurement of meters and an operational budget for continued data analyses. • Data analyses and usage, looking at common approaches to performance measurement and guidance on how to utilise statistical tools to better analyse patterns in data. The guideline had several contributors and partners, including the Department of Water and Sanitation, the Ministry of the Environment of Denmark, the NCPC-SA, the International Finance Corporation, the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, the Water Research Council and GreenCape. Workshops were held where representatives from government and industry gave input. 38 | www.opportunityonline.co.za
National Cleaner Production Centre South Africa A national industrial support programme that partners with industry to drive the transition towards a green economy and save money.
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