Pon Power News

ASK A QUESTION

ASK A QUESTION

“It was great to see sound preparation and intensive cooperation pay off with a very good result”

Richard Groenewegen

Project Manager, AAB

TWO STEPS FORWARD, ONE BACKWARD

Getting the engines to fit into the housing was not the problem as such. The challenge was in finding room for the ventilation grids, exhausts, heating, fuel tanks and operating controls: it all had to go into the pre-approved structures. Richard Groenewegen: “Another issue was that these are prefabricated buildings, meaning we had to be careful not to weaken the structure, for example, by replacing an entire wall with a ventilation grid, since this would have undermined the integrity of the construction. As you can see, it was two steps forward, one backward, all the way.” Adds Hoogervorst: “It was a case of fitting, measuring, customizing parts, relaying routings, etc. We worked intensively with AAB, our Engineering and Sales Support teams, and of course, with the people at Enza Zaden. It was a challenge having everything delivered just-in-time, and then to make it all fit. But step by step the puzzle started to make sense and in the end it all came together beautifully”. The two emergency power generators were successfully tested in February 2016 and are ready for emergency action.

“It was fitting, measuring, modifying, customizing, then going back for more fitting and measuring. But in the end, we had it all in there and working!”

Jacqueline Hoogervorst

Account Manager, Pon Power

FACTS & FIGURES

EXTERNAL TRANSFORMER HOUSES

"Enza Zaden is a world leader in the cultivation, production and sales of vegetable seeds", notes Richard Groenewegen, a project manager who supervises the construction work for the consultancy and engineering firm, AAB. "The processing and storage of the seeds is an accurate and delicate undertaking, that takes place in strictly controlled conditions. An emergency generator is powered by a combustion engine, and Enza Zaden preferred not to have the machines sitting shoulder to shoulder with their ‘capital’, as they tenderly call their seeds. Therefore, it was necessary to build two external transformer houses.”

This in itself was not a problem, except that the two, preplanned and council-approved transformer houses were strictly limited to a maximum volume and size. There wasn’t even a centimeter of stretch in them. Explains Pon Power’s Account Manager, Jacqueline Hoogervorst: “Yes, it was a tight fit. Normally speaking, we would have chosen either a smaller generator model or a larger housing. But in this case, neither option was possible. It all had to be made to fit, one way or another, and within the requisite design and safety aspects…”