Decarbonization – it’s a big word that carries with it a hefty definition and sense of responsibility. So, what exactly is decarbonization, and how does industrial insulation play a role? JM Senior Product Manager Jack Bittner and National Specifications Manager Scott Sinclair answered our questions about all things carbon emissions.
Jack: Decarbonization is the reduction of carbon emissions into the environment. Carbon emissions are the release of carbon-containing gases – primarily carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere. These come largely from burning fossil fuels. Emissions trap heat, which cause climate change and global warming. Particularly since the Industrial Revolution, human-related emissions have rapidly increased atmospheric carbon.
Carbon emissions are a concept that many people struggle to fully understand, since carbon emissions aren’t a visible, tangible thing. It can be difficult to imagine what a metric ton of carbon emissions means. A study in 2022 showed that under-insulated systems produce 68 million metric tons or more per year of unnecessary CO2 emissions. That’s a big number, but it’s still too abstract for most people to grasp.
It’s invisible. And how does it weigh a ton if it’s floating in the air? It’s something we’ve struggled to find an explanation for that makes sense to most people. We can calculate heat loss and determine how much extra fuel must be burned to make up for that heat loss. From there, we can determine the extra CO2 emissions that are generated. These numbers can help a little bit, but the concept is still a challenge.
Scott: It’s actually simple. Insulation reduces heat loss (or gain), which reduces fuel consumption, which in turn reduces carbon emissions. The results are immediate, and a well-maintained insulation system will continue to produce results for years, which is a dramatic return on investment.
Insulation has its greatest impact on hot temperature piping and equipment. Most industrial processes require heat for production. If there is no insulation on the pipes and equipment, more fuel must be burned to generate and maintain the heat that is needed. If you insulate the pipes or the system, the heat loss is significantly reduced. The boiler doesn’t work as hard and uses less fuel, so it’ll run more efficiently. As a result, you’re not generating the carbon emissions that you were generating last week.
The easiest way to reduce carbon emissions is to not generate them in the first place! That’s where insulation comes in.
Scott: Decarbonization can be done by reducing or eliminating things that produce carbon, and it can also be offset by doing things like planting trees and replacing incandescent lightbulbs with LEDs. To truly understand the scope needed to make changes, and to see how beneficial pipe insulation can be, consider the following.
Consider a 10-foot section of 8” pipe at a process temp of 900°F. According to industry estimates, the CO2 emitted by the heating system to keep that uninsulated section of pipe at 900°F equals 168,160 pounds/foot/year.* Applying just 3” of insulation to that pipe reduces the CO2 emissions to 4,840 pounds/foot/year – a reduction of 163,320 pounds per year!
Reducing carbon emissions by that amount is equal to taking 50 cars off the road permanently, or equal to the carbon footprint of 40 homes annually. Offsetting it could be achieved by swapping out 2,820 incandescent lightbulbs for LEDs or planting 3,270 trees. But those numbers are based on 10-year-old trees, so they must grow for a decade first before reaching their full offset potential.
Or, you can reduce carbon emissions by simply insulating the 10-foot section of pipe with 3” thick insulation. Same results, but faster and easier.
Considering that the average refinery has more than 50 miles of hot piping, even a single mile of properly insulated pipe leads to huge savings, both in CO2 emissions and in operating costs.
Jack: Big carbon emissions reduction results can be achieved with pipe insulation, and while the concept is simple, it’s much harder to put into practice. Why? Money speaks much louder than CO2 emissions, and insulation is often viewed as an expense instead of an investment.
But insulation is a capital investment. It pays for itself over and over, year after year. And if people looked at it that way, it would change everything. When insulation is done later, it comes out of the maintenance budget, but it’s the operations team that sees the benefits, so there’s a disconnect.
When insulation isn’t part of a project from the beginning, many facilities balk at the cost of it down the line, even though the ROI can be enormous. Looking back at our example of the 8” pipe operating at 900°F, analysis done in 2022 showed that the cost to insulate 100 feet of pipe with 3” of insulation was about $4,630. The resulting energy (fuel) cost savings are about $63,069, every year. This is a first year ROI of 1,362%! This is a prime example of why insulation is an investment, not an expense.
Yet if it’s difficult to get a facility to spend money to ultimately save money, then it’s arguably harder to encourage an expenditure to save on carbon emissions.
Jack: The great thing is that the JM industrial high-temp insulation products we manage all pay for themselves. The amount of energy needed to produce JM’s high-temp insulation products is quickly recouped via the amount of energy saved by using that insulation – often within a matter of months. The same goes for emissions that are created during production, versus saved by installing the insulation. From that point on, insulation products continue to save energy and emissions, so they pay for themselves time and again. It’s not a one-time reduction in emissions.
The National Insulation Association (NIA) offers many courses focused on reducing industrial and commercial emissions through mechanical insulation, decarbonization strategies and energy efficiency tools.
There are NIA Certified Insulation Energy Appraisers who can conduct insulation assessments at facilities to determine potential savings and reduction in emission levels that can be achieved with the help of insulation.
*Calculated using NAIMA’s 3E Plus® tool
