Eastman Chemical Company: Energy performance

Better Buildings, Better Plants Challenge partners strive to decrease portfolio-wide source energy use intensity (EUI), and to increase the percent improvement compared to a set baseline. Eastman's portfolio consists of 12 plants as of 2019. Eastman's energy management program emphasizes employee engagement, rigorous data tracking, innovative technology solutions, replication of best practices, standardized energy initiatives, the execution of energy efficiency projects, and the incorporation of energy efficiency in capital investments. Eastman's recent focus has been on developing very robust data tracking methodologies and reporting tools. Beginning with the 2014 data, Eastman adopted a new methodology for tracking energy efficiency improvement at its facilities that is normalized for weather and production. 

Looking at the percent improvement in energy performance across all facilities can provide insight into how an organization is saving energy. Several of Eastman's facilities participating in the Challenge Program have improved energy performance by >15% since the baseline year of 2008. A number of actions taken by Eastman at the facility level since 2008 have contributed to its overall energy efficiency improvement.  Example areas of focus include the optimization of:  lighting, process controls, chiller systems, steam & power generation, heat integration within existing processes, and distillation.

Eastman produces many different products.  As a result, energy consumption is modeled and evaluated at several levels from individual cost centers to entire plants.  Source energy use, production output, and weather conditions are tracked for each facility on both a monthly and annual basis.  Eastman normalizes its energy use to account for the impacts of production volume and several weather-related variables.  Interactions among these variables are also considered.  Total corporate improvement in energy use is calculated by taking a weighted average of the improvements in energy intensity for each facility.