By Richa Chakravarty
The industrial sector accounts for nearly 42 per cent of India’s commercial energy use. In fact, India’s energy efficiency is the fifth lowest in the world, claims The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI). However, there is also a vast opportunity for energy efficiency in the industrial sector. In most industries, the energy cost impacts the cost of the end product, and hence, a company’s competitiveness within the industry. This offers significant motivation for industry to adopt energy efficient measures.
Awareness about energy conservation in Indian industries has grown tremendously over the last few years. This has been due to both market requirements and a strong government initiative. Organisations such as the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) and TERI have contributed tremendously through pilot programmes, training and proposing regulation.
Recognising the large scope for adopting energy efficient measures in industry, many energy service companies and startups are venturing into this domain. Established in April 2008 in Chennai, Wysine Technologies Pvt Ltd is one such firm. Wysine stands for ‘What you sense is not enough,’ and it provides solutions that streamline the power usage of industries in India. The firm’s product tracks power drawn by an industry from the state grid and from newer sources such as solar panels and windmills. The companies then can tweak its production cycle to save power and costs. “Industries could shift power intensive processes to off-peak time when electricity is cheaper and perhaps more regular,” says B Visweswaran, CEO, Wysine Technologies Pvt Ltd.
The two products launched by Wysine Technologies are Wymon and SmartEN. Wymon is a realtime monitoring and management software that provides actionable information to control the use of energy, water and carbon at a plant or facility. Wymon integrates with existing smart meters and helps identify problems, track improvements and controls costs. On the other hand, the SmartEN solution consists of multiple plugs, which can be integrated into consumer electronic products such as a controller for a split AC, to monitor and manage energy. Apart from saving energy, the other benefits that these products offer are that they can be used in existing infrastructure to the maximum extent possible. These products are IP enabled and allow monitoring and control from remote locations as well.
“Our solution can cater not only to large industries but also to small and medium businesses. Quite a few of our customers have chosen to start with a subset of features and then scale up based on their need and criticality,” adds Visweswaran.
Though energy monitoring is not as prevalent in India as it is in developed nations like the US and European countries, positive steps are being taken by BEE towards increasing awareness about energy efficiency in industries. It is high time that manufacturers start adopting all the possible procedures to make their business green.
