Going Green with 3 New Sustainability Projects

At MAT Foundry, reducing our impact on the environment is a full-time commitment. We’re always looking for innovative ways to shrink our carbon footprint, and – as a result - are proud to announce three new sustainability projects across our international operations.

1. Eco-Friendly Shower Power

In our Chinese foundry, MDAP, we’re re-purposing the waste heat from air compressors to warm up the water in our employee showers.

This has reduced our gas consumption by 2000 M3 per year.

The process involves capturing the waste heat generated by air compressors and transferring it to a water heating system. The heated water can then be used for hot showers, reducing the need for additional energy sources like electricity or gas.

Benefits of using this system include:

Energy efficiency. By utilising waste heat from air compressors, MDAP can reduce its energy consumption for water heating, leading to cost savings and a smaller carbon footprint.

Consistency. Since air compressors often run continuously or for extended periods in industrial settings, there is a consistent supply of waste heat available, ensuring a reliable source of hot water for employee showers.

Reduced dependence on conventional energy sources. Integrating waste heat utilisation reduces the reliance on conventional energy sources like electricity or natural gas, contributing to overall energy diversification.

2. Adiabatic Cooling for Reduced Water Consumption

We’ve replaced the furnace water cooling towers in our Czech facility, EURAC Hradec, with adiabatic cooling towers. This has shrunk our water consumption by 13,000 M3 per year.

Adiabatic cooling is a process where the temperature of air is reduced by the evaporation of water, without any heat exchange with the surrounding environment. As a result, adiabatic cooling towers reduce water consumption while maintaining efficient cooling of process fluids or air.

Traditional cooling towers work by evaporating water to remove heat from the process fluid (or air that needs to be cooled). However, in such systems, a significant amount of water is lost due to evaporation. Adiabatic cooling towers are designed to reduce this water loss by incorporating a pre-cooling stage, which involves the evaporation of water without direct contact with the main cooling flow.

This pre-cooling process improves overall efficiency and reduces water consumption overall.

3. Clean 3D-Printed Cores

Eurac Poole is now equipped with a 3D printer, which the team are leveraging to manufacture small tooling inserts for the core making process.

With this method in place, the traditional two-part resin inserts can be replaced, including the associated waste resin tins (which are hazardous). This has prevented 1MT of hazardous waste going to landfill each year.

At MAT Foundry, we’re always innovating to improve our processes – and sustainability is a key focus across all of our sites.

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