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Mendip District Council reduce energy
consumption by 50%

Increases in utility costs have had a great impact on leisure centres across the country.
Avalon Leisure operate several facilities for Mendip District Council.

Following initial discussions Avalon Leisure requested Excalibur
undertake a survey to investigate the potential to improve the energy
efficiency of their pumps, fans and boilers.
The survey showed that opportunities existed to make significant
reductions in energy consumption at Strode Pool in Street, Frome
Leisure Centre and Wells Leisure Centre. Mendip District Council
agreed to cover the cost of implementation and Excalibur were
contracted to complete the project.
The survey showed that all of the swimming pool circulating pumps
were using throttling valves to achieve the required flow rates. Excalibur
proposed installing inverters to these pumps, allowing the valves to be
opened and motor speed reduced to achieve the correct flow rates.
As you would expect, pool occupation varies considerably, the
introduction of intelligent control to the motors made it possible
to match pump flow rates to pool occupation. These modifications
reduced the electrical consumption of all swimming pool circulation
pumps by 50%.
The Main Pool Hall supply and extract fans received the same
treatment, which realised a similar reduction in electrical consumption,
while lower extract rates significantly reduced gas consumption for
heating fresh make up air.
To provide security of operation all of the inverters were mounted in
bespoke panels which incorporate an override should it be necessary
to operate the pumps independently of the inverters. Switching was
also provided to allow full speed operation during backwash of the
swimming pool filters.
The other major opportunity to reduce energy consumption was
the boilers. It was proposed to install Excalibur Stepmaster boiler
sequence control – the conventional existing control was operating
a constant flow temperature irrespective of the load in the building.
The Stepmaster provides a variable control, reducing flow temperature
during periods of low demand and reducing gas consumption by a
further 15%.

The installations were overseen by Avalon Technical Manager, Malcolm
Baker: “Excalibur completed the work professionally and to a high standard.
Monitoring shows that if anything we are achieving greater energy savings
than quoted with no detrimental effects on operation. We should recover the
costs of installation in less than one year’.

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