Employer Northern States Power (NSP) State/Province Minnesota (United States) Title Mechanical Engineer (Part-time) Employment Dates Jun. 1993 — Aug. 1993 Duration 0% (0 years) Tasks and Duties I was employed to promote a program of demand side management and energy conservation, rather than building new power plants. I primarily focused on subsidizing retrofits of lighting in factories and offices of electricity customers. Mechanical Engineers were specifically required to provide these energy audits, because we could assess other equipment loads that Electrical Engineers as not specialist in assessing. Representative Projects I was referred to electricity customers in the Minneapolis / St Paul Metropolitan area. As manufacturers could be unwilling for me to investigate their processes, I always offered to only consider their ceiling mounted and outdoor lighting. But in one instance the customer expected a grant without any auditing at all, so I called my superiors and was immediately instructed to say good bye to the reception staff of the premises and the leave immediately.
As an example of a more typical case I shared all observations with the manager and discussed with him the gap between metered consumption and tabulated lighting and office equipment. This conversation caused him to reveal a basement manufacturing area with induction motors whereby the power company could consider subsidies for variable speed inverter control as well as replacement of incandescent lighting.
Another typical example was a McDonalds restaurant which provided additional ground truth to the power company of the mix of refrigeration, HVAC and lighting loads in such premises.