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ENERGY MANAGEMENT
directly into the factory. During daylight hours this generates on average 10kW per hour, with the potential to produce even more electrical energy during the summer months. Therefore, when it came to deciding which injection moulding machine to invest in, energy efficiency was a top consideration, alongside production speed, quality, CNC reliability and repeatability. Bloom-in-Box wanted this machine purchase to support its carbon emission reduction ambitions and to be powered exclusively by the new solar panels. This search led Bloom-in-Box to FANUC’s ROBOSHOT range, which the company claims are the most energy-efficient injection moulding machines available today. “In our opinion, FANUC machines are at the top of the league table for energy efficiency in injection moulding,” says Reardon. It is well known that all-electric injection moulding machines use up to 80 per cent less electricity than a hydraulic machine of a comparable size. FANUC’s ROBOSHOT goes even further than this; the company claims it consumes 10 to 15 per cent less energy than the average all-electric machine.
ENERGY EFFICIENT DESIGN The ROBOSHOT’s best-in-category energy efficiency can largely be attributed to a combination of FANUC’s proprietary servo technology and smart energy recovery. “Rather than buying them in from a third-party manufacturer, we build our own servo drives, meaning they are as energy efficient as is physically possible. This also enables us to specify servo drives that are the perfect match for each machine’s target performance, ensuring they deliver exactly the amount of power to the motor that it needs,” explains David Raine, ROBOSHOT sales manager UK and Ireland. In addition, the ROBOSHOT’s advanced power regeneration feature enables intelligent energy recovery: when an axis decelerates, energy returns to the power source, adding to the overall savings. “When the equipment starts to decelerate and the motor is no longer required to drive a process, it automatically switches to being a generator, feeding the electricity that is generated back through the system to another location on the machine where it is needed,” says Raine. The 150T clamp force ROBOSHOT S150iA in operation at Bloom-in-Box runs at 2.9-3kW per hour for a six-second cycle (the longer the cycle the less energy consumed), reducing energy consumption by 20 per cent versus previous generation electric machines in the plastic processor’s fleet. “This represents a huge saving both in
terms of CO2 emissions and energy bills,” concludes Reardon.
As well as being well on track to becoming carbon neutral, Bloom-in-Box is well-placed to expand its garden, scoops and measures ranges and to develop new medical and PPE products.
FANUC UK
www.fanuc.eu/uk/en
Bloom-in-Box is a family-run plastic injection moulding business grounded in an ethos of responsible consumption and production.
Bloom-in-Box aims to be carbon neutral within the next 18 months. Solar installations and the new FANUC ROBOSHOT were the next steps to help achieve this.
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