Power monitoring sweetens the pot at Hershey

Like any industrial enterprise, The Hershey Company manufacturing plant in Stuarts Draft, Va., needs electrical power to create its treats. But unlike most enterprises, plant management has taken a proactive approach to power usage.

When the plant was expanded in 1997, it was difficult to gauge how much the electrical infrastructure should be upgraded, says Lorin Droppa, plant senior designer. That prompted Hershey corporate engineering to work with plant management and Droppa to better understand its power usage. That year, six Square D Powerlogic CM2350 circuit monitors from Schneider Electric were purchased, and stationed at each main and all four feeders entering the facility.

It was a good start, but only went so far – the circuit monitors weren’t connected to a centralized database that allowed for data accumulation and analysis. In 1999, Hershey added Square D System Manager software, more CM2350 circuit monitors and several PM620 power meters.

Today, the software constantly displays system status, allowing Droppa to monitor power amperage and usage, along with power quality issues like total harmonic distortion and any effect it has on the electrical distribution system.

“There are things that I’ve started to build a history on, and now when I need to know over the course of the last five years, what has this product line done — Has it grown in energy usage? Has it contracted? Does it use more power in the summer than the winter? — I can just start trending. The graphing function is what I use the most.”

The Powerlogic system has contributed to cost savings for the facility, but Droppa points out that the savings are situational, rather than conventional, such as quantifying an annual amount.

For example, he recently recognized a voltage reduction, so he contacted his utility to find out what was wrong, and within 90 minutes, the issue was corrected. Without a power monitoring system, he would have had no idea that situation had occurred and would have been paying for reduced voltage.

Droppa integrated the power monitoring equipment with the plant’s entire power distribution system at the end of 2006. He says a fully integrated system makes his plant better prepared for whatever new manufacturing processes it will eventually take on, because the data he collects via his Powerlogic system helps paint a picture of what work the plant can conceivably assume, and what it can’t.  Item 151

This article appeared in the October/November 2007 issue of MRO Today magazine. Copyright 2007.

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