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Energy Efficiency and Conservation Efforts
 High energy prices and energy price volatility – coupled with the environmental impact of energy production and consumption – make energy use a critical issue for Dow. Implementing an aggressive energy efficiency and conservation effort is an important part of Dow's plan to address this critical issue.
Business and Site energy efficiency teams have been established throughout the Company to focus both up and down as well as across the product chain. As a result of focused business and site efforts, over 700 Six Sigma projects have been chartered in the past four years to address all aspects of energy production, use, efficiency, and cost reduction.
Below are a few of the many projects that made significant contributions in 2003:
- Two older and less energy efficient ethylene crackers were shut down at Seadrift and Texas City, Texas (U.S.). A portion of the production from these units was shifted to newer, more efficient facilities resulting in 15-20 percent less energy consumed for this incremental volume.
- Dow Central Germany’s Boehlen site reduced the import of natural gas by 25 percent through efficiency improvement and energy optimization projects. This saved the site five million Euros.
- The Plaquemine, Louisiana (U.S.), EO/EG plant was able to save $7.5 million in energy costs through a comprehensive variable cost reduction program.
- Implementation of new seawater pump operation procedures at the Terneuzen, The Netherlands, site resulted in savings of over 4,000 megawatt hours of electricity.
- The MDI plant in Stade, Germany, successfully completed a project to burn hydrogen instead of natural gas for a furnace. This resulted in a reduction of natural gas purchases worth over 1.6 million Euros.
- The Chlor-Alkali, EDC/VCM, and Ethylene plants at the Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, Canada, site focused on reducing electrical energy consumed by motors. The combined effort resulted in yearly savings of almost 12,000 megawatt hours.
- A simple, yet elegant change in the process control strategy and operating procedures eliminated wasted steam in the Polycarbonate plant in Stade, Germany. The project resulted in a 20 percent reduction in total steam consumption.
- Implementation of a new boiler steam dispatch protocol at the Freeport, Texas (U.S.), site resulted in natural gas savings of over 800 million BTU's per day.
- A benchmarking study conducted by Polyolefins and Elastomers at Tarragona, Spain, resulted in a site utility optimization program that saved $625,000 in the cost of steam, compressed air, and nitrogen.
- Polypropylene operations at Freeport, Texas (U.S.), saved $865,000 on energy cost through process design upgrades, improvement of operating practices, and product mix rationalization.
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