Case

Pump-Retrofit Project Cuts Electrical Consumption in Half, Projected to Deliver One-Year Payback for Vermont Motel

Morrisville, VT — Kevin Amyot had serious qualms last spring when contractor Ed Friedrich first proposed a major pump-retrofit project at the Sunset Motor Inn, one of the properties Amyot manages for the H. A. Manosh Corporation in Morrisville. Friedrich’s $13,000 estimate called for the replacement of 18 fixed-speed circulating pumps in the heating system at the Sunset with 10 circulators from the Grundfos Pumps Corporation.

Six of the pumps would be conventional, fixed-speed circulators. But the remaining four replacement units would be energy-saving, variable-speed, “smart” circulators. This quartet coupled ECM (electronically commutated motor) technology with sophisticated electronics for matching pump output to changing system demand – automatically and without human intervention – delivering substantial energy savings in the process.

Amyot was impressed with the new technology, and not just in the abstract. Friedrich had already done a successful retrofit at the home of company president Howard Manosh, and the latter’s downsized electric bills provided eloquent testimony of the energy-savings the new smart circulators could provide.