The Association for Decentralised Energy
Located in Kilkenny City in Ireland, the hotel offers 118 guest bedrooms with leisure centre facilities, a swimming pool, meeting rooms and conference venue. It required an upgraded CHP unit to better reflect its current heating and electrical requirements so turned to Centrica Business Solutions, in conjunction with its partner Temp Technology.
Using past experience of the savings that CHP technology offers, the hotel invested in a more appropriately sized unit that would have a longer uptime and therefore generate further efficiencies and financial savings.
The CHP technology is used to heat the water for the leisure centre to 60oC which is then moved from the leisure centre to hot water storage tanks at the hotel, where it is kept at adequate temperature until required.
During the day, from 8am to 11pm, the CHP unit is operational while at night the heated water from the storage tanks is used to keep the temperature constant. The whole process is controlled automatically by a computer system monitoring the usage conditions.
The new CHP unit installed at the Kilkenny Ormonde Hotel by Centrica Business Solutions has resulted in annual energy savings of around €47,000, with payback on investment in less than three years.
Since the installation of the new system, uptime has increased by 25% which has ensured a reduction in maintenance costs. An average of 5,475 operating hours per year is projected.
The hotel has also benefited from an environmental perspective with carbon emissions reduced by 312 tonnes each year, as well as contributing to a fall in noise pollution.
The CHP unit now satisfies 65% of the total heat demands and 40% of the total electrical demands.
Colin Aherne, General Manager, Kilkenny Ormonde Hotel, said:
We are extremely happy with the new investment which has provided a number of benefits including on-site electricity generation, greater uptime, further efficiency gains, financial savings and fewer maintenance costs.
Find out how Centrica Business Solutions can power energy performance in the leisure sector.
