Focusing on sustainability: TGW Smart Energy Strategy
(Marchtrenk, Austria, 20 March 2023) Ecological, economic and social sustainability are central factors in future-oriented intralogistics. For TGW, acting in an environmentally-friendly manner is a vital aspect of business responsibility. The leading intralogistics specialist has consolidated its energy-saving initiatives for systems, modules and products into the TGW Smart Energy Strategy.
Making sparing use of resources is not only a sign of entrepreneurial responsibility but also yields concrete economic advantages, especially when raw material prices are high.
Intralogistics systems are designed for maximum throughput and capacity. If order structure and capacity utilisation temporarily do not require the system's maximum performance, the output of storage and retrieval machines, shuttles or sorters can be adapted individually. Reducing the speed from 1.2 m/s to 0.8 m/s will lower the energy consumption of KingDrive® conveyors by 15 percent. Thanks to this smart kinematics function, the wear of mechanical parts can also be decreased.
Automatically switching off system parts or entire systems and then restarting them in a controlled manner also enables significant energy savings. With the interplay of all of these measures, operators benefit from lower operating costs over the lifecycle of a fulfillment center, i.e. a lower total cost of ownership (TCO).
"As a company with over 50 years of experience in intralogistics, conscientious use of resources is a central guiding principle for TGW, whether it be during the development of new systems, modules and products or the revision of existing ones. Energy efficiency is an essential criteria for a growing number of our customers as well," points out Thomas Gruber-Blanka, Director of Product Management at TGW. "Using energy-efficient components such as IE3 drives or brushless DC motors with gearless rollers is standard practice in our portfolio."
The KingDrive® conveyor system for cartons, totes, trays and polybags, named after TGW co-founder Heinz König, makes use of maintenance-free and gearless motorised rollers as well as an integrated 48-volt power supply. The innovative technology uses the braking energy of the rollers to power other rollers in the network. Consequently, the energy stays within the system and is reused on the same site. This way, KingDrive® uses up to ten percent less energy than classic conveyor technology.
The storage and retrieval machines in the Mustang family are equipped with powerful mechanical components as well as sophisticated controls software and intelligent drive technology. Thanks to this setup, their braking energy can be recovered along the horizontal or vertical travel axis and used for travel on the respective other axis. This enables a reduction of the overall current demand by up to 17 percent.
Shuttles accelerate and decelerate several hundred times per day; the potential for saving energy is therefore especially high in this area. Their braking energy is stored in power capacitors and can then be used by all vehicles on the same level for acceleration.
Moreover, all shuttle and tote lifts are equipped with a recuperation function as a standard feature, allowing unused energy to be fed back into the power network..
