To meet our objective of continuous improvement, a key factor is the minimisation of the environmental impact of our activity, contributing to a sustainable development, that must be considered along the complete productive process: from scheduling of the works and their execution till packing and delivery.
Nortemecánica has implemented an environmental management system adapted to our activity with the aim of reducing as much generated waste as possible, and when it cannot be avoided, executing an adequate management and recycling of the residues, always complying with legal regulations in place. In this regard, Nortemecánica is enrolled in the Register of residues production and management of our region, the Principality of Asturias.
Also, promoted by the interest of the management of Nortemecánica in increasing our energy management, optimizing energy consumption and costs thus reducing our carbon print, an Integral Energetic Audit has been carried out to our productive and administrative facilities.
The audit took place within October 2019 and June 2020, following the methodology stablished in regulation UNE-EN 16247, applying the scope underlined by the Royal Decree 56/2016 and the Directive 2012/27/UE of effectiveness.
Works developed have allowed us to analyse the way our facilities consume energy (electricity, process gasses, diesel), including also water consumption, detect inefficiencies, build an energetic balance, calculate indexes and develop a series of Energy Saving Measures (ESMs). These measures have been classified as establishing priority execution criteria based on the potential energy saving and environmental impact, as well as their profitability and strategic interests of Nortemecánica.
A total of eleven measures of different nature were detected, five of them representing a saving of energy /CO2 emissions:
Measure | Energy saving (kWh/year) | CO2 saving (t CO2/year) |
---|---|---|
Installation of frequency variables to machine tool motors | 14.035 | 3,23 |
Change of lighting systems (intensive use) by LED | 41.903 | 9,64 |
Change of lighting systems (lower use) by LED | 3.964 | 0,91 |
Substitution of fixed compressors by variable ones in the compressed air circuit | 23.625 | 5,43 |
Repair of leaks in the compressed air circuit | 10.658 | 2,45 |
Total | 94.185 | 21,66 |
A short to mid-term execution plan was established, with all these measures already executed as of now, avoiding the emission of more than 20 t CO2/year.
After the implementation of these measures, we were ready to take a further step in our continued commitment to improving energy efficiency and protecting the environment and in 2023 we carried out the installation of a photovoltaic plant.
The 132 modules installed on our roof with a total of 59.40 kWp, allow us to reduce our network consumption while continuing to decrease the amount of CO2 emissions.