Energy

GE looks for treasure

February 22, 2011

Global

February 22, 2011

Global
Sarah Murray

Journalist, author, speaker

Sarah Murray is a specialist writer on business, society and the environment and a regulator contributing author for the Economist Group. 

When evaluating the rationale for identifying energy savings in industrial operations, Gretchen Hancock, General Electric’s project manager for corporate environmental programmes, suggests listening to the sounds a factory makes when it is not operational. “You hear compressed air leaking and you hear pumps running,” she says. If no revenue is being generated, those noises could also be described as the sound of money being wasted.

To weed out energy inefficiencies, GE uses a system of “energy treasure hunts” (based on a lean manufacturing process developed by Toyota) that have saved the company more than US$130m.

After training employees in reading a light meter or determining when installing a more efficient motor would be effective, they are sent into offices and manufacturing facilities, usually at weekends, to scrutinise energy use and to identify inefficiencies, such as pumps running during downtimes or equipment that could be shut off at weekends.

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