Saint-Gobain Inducts Heat Recovery System at Vancouver Facility to escalate Energy Efficiency
As part of its efforts to increase sustainability, Saint-Gobain, through its building products subsidiary, CertainTeed Canada, installed heat recovery technology at the gypsum wallboard facility in Vancouver. The firm says it will enhance the plant's energy efficiency and decrease carbon emissions by 10 per cent.
The $3.19 million investment by the firm in a heat exchanger on its industrial dryer will help solidify the wallboard and remove moisture during production. The heat exchanger will capture and recycle air emitted from the dryer to maintain the temperature in the dryer while consuming low energy and reducing carbon emissions.
CertainTeed receives a $1.1 million investment from the CleanBC Industry Fund Program as part of the project. It provides funding for the government for cleaner technologies that reduce emissions in the industry in British Columbia. Last year, in 2021, the program invested around $56 million in 25 emissions reduction projects, with an additional $77.45 provided by industry partners.
In British Columbia, the project is likely to reduce emissions by 2.5 million metric tons by 2030.
The plant in Vancouver opened in 1975 is the only gypsum wallboard manufacturing plant in British Columbia.
In March this year, the firm said its association through a Virtual Power Purchase Agreement with Blooming Grove Wind Farm in Illinois received renewable energy certificates, which facilitated scaling down around 33 per cent of carbon emissions from electricity usage at its plant in 2021.
Earlier this year, Saint-Gobain spent $32 million to update machinery at its insulation facility in Chowchilla, California. The project, which is part of a $400 million building efficiency improvement strategy across the United States, is expected to cut the facility's carbon footprint by more than 4,000 metric tonnes per year, according to the business.
The business also invested $4.3 million in a water recycling system at its Kansas City, Kansas, insulation plant, which it claims would save 227 million gallons of water per year.
