OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY
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On the site visit day, an OSU team of engineering faculty and students will spend the day touring your facility and collecting data on the operation of your equipment. Our visit will last about 8 hours, and will include the following:
Site Tour (1-2 hours)
We start with touring your plant for an hour or two with one of your employees who has knowledge about all aspects of your process. To help us serve you better, the person leading the tour should be able to point out areas on which you would like us to concentrate.
Identify Opportunities (1-2 hours)
After the tour we meet with selected staff from your plant to list the opportunities we saw. We also want to include projects that you already know about and need assistance in analyzing. For example, we can research potential solutions and equipment or calculate benefits and costs to help you determine if projects are economically feasible.
Data Collection (2-3 hours)
We will spend the next three to four hours gathering the data we will need to analyze the recommendations that we are considering. This includes measuring temperatures, pressures, power, and flow rates, as well as collecting operating schedules, quality statistics, and downtime. To aid us in gathering the necessary data it will be helpful for us to spend a little time with the following people:
Wrap-up Meeting (30 minutes)
Before we leave we would like to meet with selected members of your staff to present the opportunities we think will offer significant savings with reasonable payback and that we plan to pursue further. Your comments will be extremely valuable to us at this time to ensure that our list includes opportunities you are interested in, your priorities, and to give us feedback on assumptions.
Within 60 days you will receive a report containing specific recommendations on ways to improve productivity and to reduce energy costs and minimize waste, including estimates of implementation costs and payback periods.
In the weeks following our visit we may call or email you to clarify some points about your facility. We try to get as much information as possible during our visit but additional details may be required for a complete analysis.
We will call you in 9 months to find out which recommendations you were able to implement. We may also ask you if a representative of the U.S. Department of Energy, which funds the program, can visit or call you. This follow-up interview will take no more than half an hour. They interview approximately half of the manufacturers we serve to determine how useful our service has been.
Small and medium-sized manufacturers with Standard Industrial Classification Codes 20 through 39, who meet the following four requirements are eligible to be assessed by any Industrial Assessment Center across the nation. Larger facilities may be eligible for multiple day assessments. Manufacturers who do not meet the four requirements may be assessed by special request.