MANNOK’S LATEST SUSTAINABILITY INITIATIVE REDUCES ELECTRICITY USE IN ITS PRECAST STAIRS CURING PROCESS BY 50%

One of Mannok’s many ongoing sustainability initiatives has seen a substantial reduction in electric energy consumption. In Mannok’s Precast division, following a drive to reduce the use of electricity in the curing process of precast stairs, it has reduced its electric energy usage by 50% while maintaining fast turnaround times and its excellent quality of precast stairs.

The company’s Precast site has seven ramps of electrically powered heating tubes to ensure greater efficiency in the curing of precast stairs. Due to demanding production schedules, the heated tubes, which are always fully occupied with a cycle of curing precast stairs, are maintained at their optimum temperature at all times during operational hours.

As part of the company’s drive to reduce energy usage, the Precast Management team investigated how to reduce electricity usage within the stair curing process as the ramps of heating tubes were using large quantities of electricity.

The only opportunity to reduce energy usage was when precast stairs production was not operational. However, the tubes needed to be timed during production each day and left on after production hours to complete the curing process.

Therefore, an automated solution was required to turn the machines off at the right time once optimum curing has been achieved for the precast stairs produced each day.

The solution was the installation of a special piece of technology which has been fitted to each ramp and it is effectively turning the heated curing process off at the best times to suit its daily manufacturing schedule and give optimum results.

Following this implementation of automated technology, the electricity usage has been reduced by 50% in the precast stairs curing process.

Commenting on the success of the initiative, Thomas Coyle, Mannok’s Precast General Manager said,

“We are delighted with this outcome to make our manufacturing more sustainable and efficient. The technology operates exactly as required to reduce our electricity usage and automate how our curing system is turned on and off. At Mannok, sustainability leadership is an important value, our sustainability initiatives are ongoing, and we are committed to continuously making the Precast division more sustainable.”