Leading pumps and valves manufactures gave us a brief walk through on how upgraded and intelligent pumping solutions enable efficient water distribution across the industrial applications.

Demand drivers for industrial pumps

The pump industry is continuously evolving post the pandemic, predominantly the industry segment. We are now looking at crossing the pre-Covid levels of business activities. Off late, the pandemic has taught both industries as well as individuals to adopt solutions which can enable remote operations and digitisation. This way, they can effectively manage processes despite any eventualities and challenges. Looking at it Shankar Rajaram, Area Sales Director – Industry, INDO Region, Grundfos belives “Some industries such as pharmaceuticals and textiles have exceeded the cycle of reaching peaks and are growing faster than other sectors. Therefore, the demand for efficient and intelligent solutions is much higher for these industries than the general industry landscape overall in the last quarter.”

According to Farrokh Bhathena, Director-Sales and Marketing, KSB Limited “The major infrastructural push announced in the recent union budget to increase capex spending and significant capital outlay for public investments will create abundant opportunities in the pump sector. Moreover, there is an emphasis on infrastructure development, financial allocations for urbanisation and the development of smart cities and agriculture.”

Increasing energy-efficiency and operational efficiency in pumps

When you look at a pump as an individual standby equipment, and integrate them with the entire system in a boiler, or for water transfer and distribution, the solution providers and the pump manufacturers’ priority is to deliver optimal solutions for a customer and meeting client requirements in the most effective way. On to this, Shankar highlight Grundfos’ iSOLUTIONS, an intelligent solution. “We study the efficiency of a product and tally it with how the efficiency can be continuously maintained, irrespective of the load cycle of the customer’s process. And hence our products and solutions are aligned with customers demand are integrated with a feedback mechanism” he explains.

Farrokh, on the other hand highlights that KSB’s preference is to add energy-efficiency factors in their pumps right at the designing stage and analyse them before launch. Even their hydraulic pumps are designed in a way that they can obtain maximum efficiency in the designated applications. “Further, we also have ETA pump (global pump), which meet the requirements of the minimum efficiency index set by the European Union. Also, we have Movitec range of pumps, which is benchmark for energy efficiency. These pumps can be used in combination with the KSB PumpDrive, which is the latest generation of KSB variable speed drive. This ensures that the pump operation is always at its optimum condition and it maximises the energy savings because it is coupled with the variable frequency drive.”

Available products and solutions in pumps and valves Efficient systems need quality pumps and valves for efficient water distribution across the industries. Companies manufacture a spectrum of pumps for industries, for activities such as water intake, water treatment, water process, water transfer, distribution, effluent treatment and water disposal. Most of the pumps today are integrated with sensors or variables speed systems to ensure that the customer needs are accurately and efficiently met.

Grundfos have also been focusing on the motor offered in the pump. “Our customers pay for the overall product which includes the motor. Therefore, Grundfos has pioneered the IE5 technology, and we continue to focus on installing IE5 motors, where we can provide significant energy savings. Our product range in it includes Grundfos iSOLUTIONS, SMART Digital Dosing System; both of them are equipped with IoT and cloud application to offer precision pumping, with optimal energy and performance efficiency”, adds Shankar.

“As far as industrial pumps are concerned, KSB has always been the frontrunner. We, at KSB, already have a large product portfolio that caters to a wide range of industrial requirements; thus, we are constantly striving to add new products and solutions to our portfolio. In 2021, we launched predicates named “Gamma”, a completely indigenised product, specifically designed to meet the stringent demands of the industry. This has been designed in such a way that it will be easy for the user to service and maintain”, adds Farrokh.

On the valve side, KSB have “Gate, Globe & Check Valves” and other range of valves from 0.5 to 48 inches, which are designed for low pressure as well as high pressure applications. And further, they have expanded their product portfolio by adding Butterfly valves, dual-plate check valves, and wall valves. These valves are widely used General Industry segment for various applications in Pulp & Paper, Food processing, Pharmaceutical, all types of Process & General Industry.

Improving performance efficiency

Performance efficiency is a slightly broader subject when we look at it from the end user point of view. For instance, in pharmaceutical industries, the objective of the customer is to ensure that the end product has the right number of substances in their medicines. “This is where our SMART Digital Dosing solutions can support them in attaining the utmost accuracy”, says Shankar. While traditional pumps provide chemical dosage accuracy of around 5 percent, Grundfos’ SMART Digital Dosing can offer even as close to 1 percent. This delivers the precise composition required by pharmaceutical processes. 

In industries like textile, the biggest challenge today is affluent emission. In order to ensure that clean water is retrieved from wastewater, we have various offerings to ensure Zero Liquid Discharge. This way, the manufacturer’s process has the amount of water required for the process while benefitting from water reuse for future processes. 

Continuing the discussion, Farrukh says “All our factories are equipped with the latest high-tech machines. We are constantly upgrading our manufacturing facilities and upgrading the machines which are available in the factories, and this helps us to manufacture the components which go into the assembly of the pumps with very close tolerances and high surface finishes”. By keeping very tight clearances and high surface finish, we are able to minimise the internal losses, which helps to achieve maximum efficiency. Apart from that, we have other add-ons in our product range that help to enhance the overall efficiency of the pumpset. KSB PumpDrive is a variable speed drive, which can be coupled with any pump. KSB PumpDrive makes sure that the speed of the pump is controlled in a way that it is always operating at the optimum design point of the pump curve, where the efficiency of the pump will be the highest.

In the next years, the pump industry in India is projected to see the advent of intelligent pump systems. Intelligent systems are intended to govern and regulate fluid flow or pressure, to adapt to process changes, and to be faulttolerant in design. As these gadgets play an important role in agriculture and infrastructure, the market contributes considerably to the country’s GDP. 

We analyse the product’s efficiency and research on maintaining continual efficiency irrespective of the load cycle of the customer’s process.
Shankar Rajaram, Area Sales Director – Industry, INDO Region, Grundfos

KSB believe in designing indigenous products and expand its existing product profile through extensive research on innovation.
Farrokh Bhathena, Director-Sales and Marketing, KSB Limited.