Sustainable Insulation in Industry

To support the transition to a climate neutral society, the European Union has set itself two ambitious objectives:

- reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030

- be climate neutral by 2050, with zero net CO₂ emissions.

This can obviously only be achieved with the support and participation of all key sectors, including industry and energy supply, which account for around 35% of Europe’s primary energy use and 49% of EU emissions.

Although savings potentials may vary between regions and sectors, due to differences in energy consumption, temperature profiles and fuel mix, there is potential in all industrial sectors.

It may seem surprising, but in industry, unlike in construction, insulation is still largely underused. Therefore, the general trend is a low level of energy efficiency for many industrial facilities.

The point is that there are still no regulations to date defining a minimum level of performance for insulation to be installed in European industry.

First of all, the level of insulation applied is most often limited to safety requirements, i.e. defining the maximum surface temperature, condensation prevention, process needs or just a generic maximum density of the heat flow rate.

• In addition, the technical specifications of industrial insulation are often outdated and are still based on energy prices and environmental requirements of 10, 20 or even 30 years ago.

• Finally, in many cases thermal insulation in industry is poorly maintained and some parts remain uninsulated and create thermal bridges, resulting in excessive heat loss and avoidable CO₂ emissions.

This is partly due to a general lack of information among key decision makers on the great energy saving potential of industrial insulation, but also to a sharing or lack of clarity of responsibilities for decisions relating to maintenance and energy management. In addition to this, insulation represents only a relatively small share of investments, so it is not sufficiently taken into account or specified during the design phase or renovation programs.

Total annual savings potential in EU27

In summary, insulation systems in industry are still too rarely designed on the basis of criteria of profitability over the life of the insulated equipment, and even less in view of criteria of sustainability.

Thermal insulation plays a key role in energy consumption when we are dealing with fluids at a temperature other than room temperature. When thermal insulation is applied to industrial equipment such as boilers, furnaces, pipes, tanks and vessels, it increases the overall efficiency of the process and at the same time reduces its environmental impact: not only the energy consumption per unit of output is reduced, but also the corresponding greenhouse gas emissions.

Nevertheless, while it might be obvious that improving thermal insulation in industrial facilities directly leads to energy savings and reduced CO₂ emissions, the full potential of sustainable insulation in industry is still far from being realised.

We can support this change with the TIPCHECK (Technical Insulation Performance Check) program by providing expert analysis of your current insulation system and helping you identify additional energy-efficient saving potential.

What is TIPCHECK?

TIPCHECK is an energy audit programme for industrial facilities. It was implemented by the European Industrial Insulation Foundation (EiiF), in order to save energy and reduce CO₂ emissions thanks to insulation.

TIPCHECKs evaluate the insulation systems of existing facilities, planned projects or retrofits and demonstrate how more efficient thermal insulation could:

• Save energy
• Save costs
• Contribute to a cleaner production through reduced CO₂ emissions

Experience shows that payback times for insulation investments following TIPCHECK audits are in most only cases 1 to 2 years. In addition, the annual energy savings achieved are often in the range of 200,000 – 400,000 MWh, reducing  production costs for TIPCHECK customers by more than 7 million EUR every year.

Beyond identifying and exploiting energy efficiency potentials, the TIPCHECK thermal energy audit can help identify process efficiency improvements and personnel safety risks.

At Saint-Gobain, we have 13 certified TIPCHECK engineers who can carry out TIPCHECK audits, internally or at our customers. To prepare for an audit, the TIPCHECK engineer will request some initial information concerning the installations to be audited: general and detailed drawings, current insulation specification of the areas to be checked, operating temperature of each zone, process diagram, type of energy used (gas, electricity, etc.), energy price.

The audit will then take place in three stages:

1. Field measurements to collect all the data
2. Based on the data collected, we draw up an inventory of the actual performance of the installations, taking into account the existing insulation. Then we recommend an optimised insulation system.
3. And finally, we deliver to the customer a standardised TIPCHECK report detailing the conclusions of the audit.