PEAK LOAD CONTROL FOR A PULP AND PAPER-MILL

The cost of electrical power has become a major aspect of production costs in the pulp and paper mills of Canada. As the world paper market becomes more and more competitive there is increasing pressure to reduce production costs, and electrical power is an obvious target. Major reductions in power bills may be achieved through peak demand shaving and by load shifting where time-of-use rates are in effect. A general misconception still exists:among those responsible for production, that no significant savings may be realized without equally significant production losses being incurred, or without making them more vulnerable to unexpected equipment failures. This paper attempts to demonstrate that. these skeptical views are mostly not valid and that substantial savings are possible with little or no production loss. Peak load Control is, of course, not a new concept, but is rather becoming more challenging as the power companies begin offering demand levelling incentives such as time-of-use rates. Time-of-use rates are used in Canada to a lesser degree than in the U.S.A., but one can expect this rate structure to become more popular here.