EMS 4.0 Turns Rising Energy Costs into Measurable Manufacturing Gains

Following the dramatic rise in electricity cost, energy consumption is becoming an increasingly important variable that must be carefully managed. Energy management systems have long offered a solution. But only now is there an IIoT-supported application for the capture and optimisation of energy consumption, which, as in many other areas of digitalisation, promises considerable added value.

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For decades, energy costs were a reliable, predictable variable in production, and with competitive costs of around 5 cents per kWh, they were easy enough to calculate. There are several reasons this calculation is no longer reliable; the war in Ukraine and the energy transition prompted by climate change are perhaps the most significant. In any event, organisations should now budget around 25 cents per kWh, which means that energy costs have a much greater impact on production costs, and energy-intensive companies in particular face major problems.

There is no improvement in sight. Quite the opposite, in fact. CO₂ pricing will drive up energy costs, and the urgent need to renew and expand electricity grids will require those costs to be passed on to users.

Managing energy – a task for today and tomorrow

These systems are especially useful when they are fully integrated into the organisation's or production department's data environment and not operated as standalone devices. This way, the 'adjustment screws' for targeted optimisation and clear allocation of energy costs to individual products or production steps will be transparent (in the best-case scenario).

EMS 4.0: comprehensive database for optimising energy consumption

tec.nicum, the Schmersal Group's newly established service division (see text box), has developed a modular solution, the 'Energy Management Solution 4.0' (EMS). It is part of a comprehensive IIoT platform whose task is to bring transparency to production and provide users with a comprehensive database for far more than just energy consumption.