The Development And Promotion Of Interactive Energy Management Tools For Industrial Energy Users

Despite the opportunity for increased energy efficiency, many industrial companies still face significant obstacles in that regard. To benefit small and medium industries located in Arkansas (and nationally), the Engineering Technology Department at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) developed an Interactive Energy Management Tool (IEMT) for Arkansas Companies, with funding from the Arkansas Energy Office (AEO). This tool is a webbased software resource, which can be accessed from any remote web-browser. The IEMT is capable of providing users (industries) with customized recommendations with regard to energy conservation based on their specific inputs (data) to the software. The energy topics available for consideration are: lighting, motors, motor drives, fans and blowers, pumps, heaters and ovens, boilers, furnaces, steam and steam leaks, and compressed air. However, the utility of the IEMT is directly linked to the number of industries that utilize it. The overall success of IEMT depends upon the promotion and evaluation of the tool among a variety of companies. The promotion of the IEMT involved visiting and making presentations to nine industrial companies. It also involved a one-day workshop involving in-depth training with tutorials, using examples from actual industrial systems. The goal of this paper is to provide an overview of the IEMT, and to present the details of how the IEMT was promoted by means of onsite visits to various industrial companies. The structure and educational philosophy of the one-day workshops will also be presented. In this regard the methodology applied should have general applicability to other educational endeavors.