Vacon was found on the 9th of November 1993 by a group of 13 key employers at the Vaasa factories of ABB industry Oy. They started making a race towards the goal of becoming the leading global suplier. Since then about 1200 of people have joined the team serving a whole range of customers all over the world. Vacon make AC drives for elevators mainly. Vacon saves energy by using AC Drives.

Vacon have many factories all over the world.Vacon´s headquarters are in Vaasa. They have factories in : Europe : Finland, United Kingdom, Hungary and many more. Africa : Egypt, Kenya, Morocco and South Africa. North America : USA and Canada. South America : Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela. Asia and Australia : Thailand, Vietnam, China, Australia, Sri Lanka and many more.

Saving energy with AC drives

The first AC Drive was found in AC Drives are also known as ajustable speed drivers. This is a Vacon 50X this has low noise polution so it will not be loud. It is also a small size so it will not take up to much room. This is a Vacon NXL. An AC Drive controls the speed of a electrical motor.

How the AC drive saves energy:

Saving energy is important Non-renewable energy sources are runnning out Using lots of energy is bad for the environment because of the emissions.

The industry is the biggest energy consumptior 60% of the electricity consumed by industry is used by electrical motors. (European Copper Institute, 2004) If these motors where equipped with AC drives the potential saving would be 29% of the energy consumption.

Energy-saving potential by using AC drives The energy-saving potential is 25 to 30% in electric drive Systems In Europe the use of AC drives could result in an annual saving of 50 billion kWh. This is equal to about 1.25 times the electricity production of all wind power units in Europe in 2003.

AC drives are used in : Material handling – Cranes – Conveyors – Warehouse automation – Packaging machines – Textile drying machines People movement – Elevators – Escalators Flow control – Compressors – Fans – Pumps – High speed compressors Plastics – Extruders – Cable manufacturing lines – Plastic lines – In-line drives – Winders Marine & offshore auxiliary drives – Winches, winch systems – Steering – Oil drilling – Pumps – Compressors