Alfred Ritter, better known as Ritter Sport, has been producing chocolate since 1912 and now exports it to over 100 countries. The company not only insists on high quality raw materials, production and products, but also regards sustainability as a major priority. It was awarded the Sustainability Award for its work in this area in 2018. In order to provide optimum monitoring of its own cogeneration plant and therefore to reduce its overall energy consumption, Ritter Sport has installed Siemens energy management solutions. The aim is to use this to reduce energy consumption by 1,5% per year.
At Ritter Sport, the subject of ecology is part of the company’s daily philosophy. The business cultivates its own cocoa beans in Nicaragua and is particularly concerned with sustainable production along the whole value chain. It is therefore no surprise that electricity comes from environmentally friendly, in-house sources – such as the cogeneration plant put into operation in 2002. Following modernisation in 2016, the cogeneration plant now supplies 9,9 million kilowatt hours. Ritter Sport therefore covers a good third of its energy demands and 70% of its heat requirement. The chocolate manufacturer is now using the Siemens Simatic Energy Manager Pro energy management software to reduce its energy consumption year on year and to meet the requirements of ISO 50001 (the standard for the development of systematic energy management).
The company insists on high quality raw materials production and products in its manufacturing facilities as well as sustainability along the whole value chain.
Reducing consumption year on year
Eberhard Pfeifer, workforce manager at Ritter Sport, explains the company’s ambitious plans: “We want to reduce our energy consumption by 1,5%, year on year. This system is the first step in knowing exactly how much energy is required to produce each individual chocolate bar.” Simatic Energy Manager Pro captures all the manufacturing and energy data from the building management system and provides a detailed display of the information. In future, this will be provided by a Simatic S7-1200 controller and S7-1500 controllers as well as Simatic AI Energy Meter for Simatic ET 200SP. The solution can be extended on a modular basis and is intuitive and easy to operate. Ritter Sport also plans to install Sentron PAC measuring devices in order to connect even more measurement points to the system.
Less expense – significant effect
The Simatic Energy Manager Pro software was installed on site within four days and Siemens trained the employees at the same time. The energy management system allows Ritter Sport to integrate and link data from a range of sources such as production, building technology and energy production. The company is thus able to correlate consumption and production data and to understand how much energy is required by which process. This is the only way to detect potential savings. The information is available via both stationary and mobile devices and can be quickly retrieved. Benjamin Flaig, energy manager at Ritter Sport, provides a positive summary: “I have a motto – energy efficiency means being smart with minimum effort. The Simatic Energy Manager fits this perfectly as a great deal can be gained here with very little expense.”
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