Kolín-based carmaker TPCA Toyota Peugeot Citroën Automobile calls itself a “green factory”. Is it really eligible for such a title? Nearly 40 participants of a professional seminar held on Thursday, 1 November at TPCA tried to find the answer. Representatives of the government, municipalities and local enterprises heard from the management how important it is to incorporate environmental protection in the company’s vision. The company’s environmental experts presented the most interesting projects implemented by the plant in recent years. Their practical demonstration in the manufacturing process strongly impressed the visitors.„It was incredibly interesting to see for oneself how a simple idea can save so much water,“ Jana Štiková of Lučební závody Draslovka Kolin commented on one of the presented projects in the otherwise inaccessible paint shop.

„We wanted the representatives of local companies to see that saving a lot of energy or reducing the waste does not always require big projects with high initial investments. The most interesting ones are projects built on ideas of the employees. Interesting is that these projects could have the same benefit as projects with huge investment to technology “, Satoshi Tachihara, explained the reasons for holding the seminar.

Main pillars of the Green Factory project

Since the very beginning of TPCA’s operation in the region of Kolín, the carmaker has been pursuing the most efficient use of energy in production, motivate its employees to environmental friendly approach, producing vehicles with low consumption of fuel and very low emissions, while also supporting projects aimed at the protection of the environment through the TPCA Partnership for the Kolín region grant programme.

TPCA’s ESCO teams

In addition to the standard tool used to minimise the environmental impact (kaizen), the seminar presented the company’s ESCO teams. ESCO teams are trained specialized maintenance staff teams searching for possible ways to save energy. Unbelievably, even when idling, a machine can consume up to 80% of the energy required for running at full capacity. Through adaptation of working procedures during downtimes and during the start and end of production, it is possible to realize significant reductions of consumed electric power. The 16 projects implemented at TPCA so far resulted in saving 9.6 million korunas a year and 2,613 tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

Specific project: reduced consumption at paint shop ovens

Changed system of turning off oven fans after the end of production:
According to the original settings, paint shop oven fans were turning off all at once after the end of production. By changing the system to turning the fans off one by one as the last car passes, energy consumption was reduced by 123.6 MWh at zero cost. Also, this prevented 62 tons of carbon dioxide from getting into air, as such a volume would be otherwise generated by a power plant to produce the saved energy.

Changed system of turning on oven cooling zones upon the start of production:
Prior to implementing the project, the oven cooling zone was turned on immediately after the production started. By turning on the cooling zone not earlier than with the first car approaching, TPCA saves 76 MWh of energy and 38 tons of CO2 emissions not generated from energy production every year.

Radek Kňava

TPCA Press Department

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Toyota Peugeot Citroën Automobile (TPCA) is a joint venture of Toyota Motor Corporation and PSA Peugeot Citroën, built in 2002 in the industrial zone of Kolín - Ovčáry. Production was started in February 2005 and reached the planned yearly capacity of 300,000 cars the year after. As per today, TPCA employs 2,600 members of staff. TPCA ranks among the biggest exporters in the Czech Republic. The manufacturing plant based in Kolín produces the models of Toyota Aygo, Peugeot 107 and Citroën C1, reliable city cars with low consumption of fuel. TPCA employs the most environment-friendly technology, as proven with the BAT (Best Available Techniques) certificate, which the plant was awarded along with an international certificate of management of environmental protection EN ISO 14001:2004. TPCA has donated more than CZK 95 million in support of the region of Kolín so far.