Honeywell’s smart grid project with Custom Building Products has earned the Southern California Chapter of the Association for Energy Engineers (AEE) “Energy Project of the Year” award. The Honeywell project provides Custom Building Products with precise control over how its Bell, Calif., manufacturing facility uses energy, enabling it to automatically respond to changing peak electricity prices and trim utility bills.
The project was singled out for its “high level of substantiated savings, which will enable the work to pay for itself within an estimated five months.” Custom Building Products offset the $80,000 total project cost with rebates from Southern California Edison (SCE) and support from a Smart Grid Investment Grant Honeywell received from the Department of Energy. Those funds lowered the out-of-pocket expenses to less than $3,000. And Custom Building Products expects to realize $6,000 in annual energy savings due to the upgrades and the resulting enhanced control.
For the project, Custom Building Products enrolled its 142,000-square-foot building in an automated demand response (Auto DR) program, managed by Honeywell, to control how facility equipment responds to SCE’s dynamic pricing structure. Engineers installed technology to enable the facility’s existing automation system to receive and respond to price signals SCE sends using the Akuacom Demand Response Automation Server (DRAS) from Honeywell.
For the project, Custom Building Products enrolled its 142,000-square-foot building in an automated demand response (Auto DR) program, managed by Honeywell, to control how facility equipment responds to SCE’s dynamic pricing structure. Engineers installed technology to enable the facility’s existing automation system to receive and respond to price signals SCE sends using the Akuacom Demand Response Automation Server (DRAS) from Honeywell.
Jim Bell, Custom Building Products facilities and maintenance manager notes, “This project enabled us to optimize our production lines to react to dynamic pricing, maximizing our energy savings in the process,” “Honeywell also uncovered energy-efficiency opportunities while helping implement our complex automation strategies, which will lead to both short-term and permanent cost savings.”
As a result of the Honeywell’s Auto DR strategies, Custom Building Products can shed more than 330 kilowatts of its typical 520-kilowatt load during events for substantial savings.
Custom Building Products provides tile and stone installation systems for the North American market. For more information, visit www.custombuildingproducts.com .
