Energy Efficiency in Ballina Waste Water Facility

Energy Audit:

An energy audit was carried out on the Ballina Waste Water Facility in the summer of 2008. It emerged that 60% of the energy use at this site was in the aeration process. It also emerged that there were no controls on the aeration pumps. It was recommended to install DO sensors and variable speed drives on the aeration pumps. With this upgrade, the speed of the pumps ramped up and ramped down in accordance with the oxygen demand in the waste water. This upgrade reduced the energy consumption in the aeration process by 25% and the overall plant by 17% (75,000kWh).

Implementation:

This project was implemented in October 2009. This project was part funded by SEAI’s “Support for Exemplar Energy Efficiency Project” fund. Annual savings of ~€15,000 were realised with this project.

Results:

The results of this project are illustrated below.