Taco - disconnected from the grid!

Steamhead (in transit)

the next Wetstock (after Denver) in that area, and tour their plant. What say ye, Dan?

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Dave Yates (GrandPAH)_2

Saw the most amazing thing earlier today

& it had nothing to do with hydronics - or, then again - it had everything to do with hydronics.

Taco, as it turns out, decided to cut their tie to the grid-tie & make their own electricity. Six co-gen turbines with their exhaust piped to the next room where heat is extracted for hydronics and cooling via an absorbtion chiller. Way too cool!

IAQ at Taco is way up & energy waste is way down. The plant was streamlined too, but no jobs were eliminated. No one gets laid off when things are streamlined. They are retrained and reassigned at, or above, their current pay-grade. Kinda took the brakes off of getting employee feedback when those who work in the trenches saw ways to improve the productivity. Forward thinking at its best.

Hats off for such a strong committment to the future and for remaining loyal to the employees.

Dave_4

Hey great for Taco!!! Off topic ouestion? What is your choice of the minisplit heat pump with invertor technology.

Dave_4

Tour Taco!! That would be a yes for sure.

The Wire Nut

Tour de Taco

I was honored to have a Tour of Taco this summer with the inimitable Johnny H. White as a guide. The plant was well organized but flexible enough to have them switch around the production line into their new space, without having any significant down time.

To a one, the employees there, many of them first or second generation immigrants from all over the world, were genuinely happy to see Mr. White. They'd often give him a hug, pat on the back, a handshake and always a smile. He said that whenever he was having a bad day, he'd come down and walk the floor, it invariably lifted his spirits.

He repeated often that the people who worked there were his family, and he cared deeply about them. As Dave mentioned, they do everything they can not to let people go, but to retrain and retain. They also run summer camps for the employees kids, and I believe he mentioned that they also have after school programs too.

He was also passionate, as Dave also mentioned, that they are committed to "Green" processes (beyond their product's color!).

As an example, at the spray paint line, mostly robotic, he has asked his engineers to find a way to have the spray heads not shoot paint during the brief period between the castings coming down the line. If they were shut off during the brief interval the spray heads would last 1/2 as long, which is expensive in time and material to replace. I have no doubt that they will come up with a way not to have that small bit of paint end up as mere VOC.

They also have some pretty neat automation there, some of which was designed and built at the factory. It was a mechanical Bolshoi to say the least...

All in all, very impressive and an example of how it is still possible to do high volume and high quality production in the US.

Thanks Johnny!

Alex "Stonehouse" Marx ("The Wire Nut")

Ross_7

Co-genplant & absorption chillers

The univerisity that I work for is planning to build a co-gen solid fuel (i.e wood chips, etc.) plant for on campus electricity demands, and steam generation. We already have a boiler plant for centralized 85# steam right now, but this new plant will be installed right next door. We already have quite a few absorption chillers that I work on, but it would be great to have more. Our oldest absorber on campus is from 1963 & still purring like a kitten. Absorption chillers are almost like a seperate "lost art" by themselves. All kinds of fun!
Ross

Dave Yates (GrandPAH)_8

3rd place winner Santa Clara at Solar Decathlon

Had an absorbtion chiller with Taco pumps. They almost didn't make it to the show! They broke three axles along the way and were the last team to arrive. Buster their humps setting up & managed to be the second team finished assembling their exhibit! The controls the Santa Clara student engineering team developed work so well that the manufacturer of the chiller is planning on using them for all of their absorbtion chillers.

hot_rod

An article about that system

was in one of the engineering magazines recently. I'll dig around. PMEngineer perhaps?? Maybe Engineered Systems?

Nice commitment to the greening movement, thanks taco.

hot rod