Title: Sustainable Green efforts of Grundfos to sustain Renewable Energy

Author: Prasanna.P

Affiliation: Assistant Professor, Department of Commerce,

Sri Krishna Institutions, Coimbatore-641 008.
Address:
67, Om Gayathri Nagar,
Kurumbhapalayam,
Vedapatti (Post),
Coimbatore – 641 007.

Email ID:
Author: [email protected]
Mobile:
Author: (91) 9443481199
 Sustainable Green efforts of Grundfos to sustain Renewable Energy
Abstract
The case is about Grundfos India Ltd. which is a Dutch based company and has
always been in forefront of delivering sustainable pump solutions. It was a great turning point
for Grundfos India when it built its plant in March 2005 as “Green Building” which was the
first Gold Rated Green Building in India under LEED (Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design) certified by US Green Building Council. Within two years, they were
able to pay back 10% of their increased investments.
Its Green Building in Chennai show their respect and concern towards the
environment. They have constructed the Green Building with double skin brick wall with
25mm air cavity in order to reduce the heat load inside the building. Double-glazed low U
glass has been used in the key areas of the building. Due to the efficient architectural
construction day light is used 95% of the time. They have reduced 38% in water consumption.
They also reduced energy consumption and CO2 emission. They reduced the electricity
consumption from 25% in 2008 to 15% in 2009. They have reduced 60% of hazardous waste.
10% of old salvaged materials were used for new constructions. Almost 60% of the materials
used in the building are having highly recycled contents like Steel, Glass, Brick, Fly ash
cement, MDF wood. The sustainable energy management efforts pulled down the island
effect. The firm is able to achieve sustained savings of 12% due to optimized life cycle
economic performance. The project is eco-friendly, financially feasible and technologically
sound.
Key words: Green building, Island effect, LEED
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1.0. Introduction
Green building is the practice of increasing the efficiency with which the buildings use
resources like — energy, water, and materials — while minimizing the building impact on
human health and the environment during the building's lifecycle, by means of better
atmosphere, design, construction, operation, maintenance. The purpose of the Green buildings
are to reduce the overall impact of the environment on human health and the natural
environment by efficient usage of energy, water, and other resources, protecting resident
health and improving employee’s efficiency, reducing waste, pollution and environmental
degradation. Leaving an air gap in the hollow walls while building in concrete by using
thermocole and extruded polystyrene materials in the walls and ceilings for energy saving,
and trying more traditional methods like clay shells on the roof, innovation in green
architecture are emerging fairly rapidly in many parts of the country.
The cost is recovered within two-three years by the savings in maintenance costs,
making the concept extremely popular. In case of Grundfos, the direct cost has been
drastically bought down by 52%. In Gujarat, for example, an architectural firm devised a
method of sandwiching window blinds in the gap between two panes of glass, and moving
these blinds with tiny electrical motors in a manner that sun rays affect the interior space as
little as possible
Green concepts and techniques puts a great effort in dealing various national issues
like treatment of consumer waste, water efficiency, energy efficiency and conservation of
natural resources can enhancement of occupants health and wellbeing. 315 Green Buildings
are there in India, including 250 commercial and among them Grundfos Green building in
Chennai was certified as India’s First Gold Rated Green building. Grundfos develops,
manufactures and sells energy efficient motors and sophisticated electronics. They have
developed a number of ground breaking technologies within a sustainable perspective. At all
stages of production, quality is controlled effectively as they have a high degree of own
production. Group strives to offer its employees further training and to create a challenging
environment that promotes the development of new products with an increased utility value
that provides the highest quality levels to their customers.
2.0. Review
Overview of the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green
Building Rating System, "a third-party certification program and the nationally accepted
benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings."

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Find details about LEED ratings systems for new construction and existing buildings, and
specific building types such as schools and health care. Many sections include profiles of
specific buildings and projects. From the U.S. Green Building Council.(www.LEED.com).
Since buildings have considerable impacts on the environment, it has become necessary to
pay more attention to environmental performance in building design. However, it is a difficult
task to find better design alternatives satisfying several conflicting criteria, especially,
economical and environmental performance. This paper presents a multi-objective
optimization model that could assist designers in green building design. Variables in the
model include those parameters that are usually determined at the conceptual design stage and
that have critical influence on building performance. Life cycle analysis methodology is
employed to evaluate design alternatives for both economical and environmental criteria. Life
cycle environmental impacts are evaluated in terms of expanded cumulative energy
consumption, which is the sum of energy consumption due to resource inputs and abatement
energy required to recover the negative impacts due to waste emissions. A multi-objective
genetic algorithm is employed to find optimal solutions. A case study is presented and the
effectiveness of the approach is demonstrated for identifying a number of Pareto optimal
solutions for green building design.(Weimin Wanga R. Z., 2005). Global human progress
occurs in a complex web of interactions between society, technology and the environment as
driven by governance and infrastructure management capacity among nations. In our
globalizing world, this complex web of interactions over the last 200 years has resulted in the
chronic widening of economic and political gaps between the haves and the have-nots with
consequential global cultural and ecosystem challenges. At the bottom of these challenges is
the issue of resource limitations on our finite planet with increasing population. The problem
is further compounded by pleasure-driven and poverty-driven ecological depletion and
pollution by the haves and the have-nots respectively. These challenges are explored in this
paper as global sustainable development (SD) quantitatively; in order to assess the gaps that
need to be bridged. Although there has been significant rhetoric on SD with very many
qualitative definitions offered, very few quantitative definitions of SD exist. The few that do
exist tend to measure SD in terms of social, energy, economic and environmental dimensions.
In our research, we used several human survival, development, and progress variables to
create an aggregate SD parameter that describes the capacity of nations in three dimensions:
social sustainability, environmental sustainability and technological sustainability. Using our
proposed quantitative definition of SD and data from relatively reputable secondary sources,
132 nations were ranked and compared. (Victor E. Udo, 2009). Simulation-based

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optimization can assist green building design by overcoming the drawbacks of trial-and-error
with simulation alone. This paper presents an object-oriented framework that addresses many
particular characteristics of green building design optimization problems such as hierarchical
variables and the coupling with simulation programs. The framework facilitates the reuse of
code and can be easily adapted to solve other similar optimization problems. Variable types
supported include continuous variables, discrete variables, and structured variables, which act
as switches to control a number of sub-level variables. The framework implements genetic
algorithms to solve (1) unconstrained and constrained single objective optimization problems,
and (2) unconstrained multi-objective optimization problems. The application of this
framework is demonstrated through a case study which uses a multi-objective genetic
algorithm to explore the trade-off relationship between life-cycle cost and life-cycle
environmental impacts for a green building design. (Weimin Wang, 2005). Over the past few
years, “Sustainable Development” (SD) has emerged as the latest development catchphrase. A
wide range of nongovernmental as well as governmental organizations have embraced it as
the new paradigm of development. A review of the literature that has sprung up around the
concept of SD indicates, however, a lack of consistency in its interpretation. More important,
while the all-encompassing nature of the concept gives it political strength, its current
formulation by the mainstream of SD thinking contains significant weaknesses. These include
an incomplete perception of the problems of poverty and environmental degradation, and
confusion about the role of economic growth and about the concepts of sustainability and
participation. How these weaknesses can lead to inadequacies and contradictions in policy
making is demonstrated in the context of international trade, agriculture, and forestry. It is
suggested that if SD is to have a fundamental impact, politically expedient fuzziness will have
to be given up in favor of intellectual clarity and rigor. (Lele, 1991)
3.0. Organizational Background
Exhibit -1: Factory building of Grundfos

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 In 1945, Poul Due Jensen created his first pump and named his company as which is
one of the world’s prime and leading pump manufacturer obtained the quality certificate ISO
9001 in 1989.Grundfos is a Danish word meaning “ground spring”, and Grundfos is a
company that was quite literally built from basement up. Presently, Jen Jorgan Madsen (group
president) leads this international company dedicated to design, produce, and distribution of
advanced technology water pumps and pumping system.
Grundfos pumps have a great uniformity in their product finish; performance is an
unquestioned fact, owing primarily to strict monitoring of quality control, production process,
which in turn is a result to ensure higher satisfaction of the users. From a small turnover of Rs
50 million in 1999 to a modest of Rs 110.5 cores in 2009 Grundfos India has seen a very
impressive growth.
Grundfos commenced its operation with a great phase by combining the modern
technologies in micro-electronic into a certainty in domestic, industrial, building, irrigation,
and service sector. Research and development played a vital role in these advancements.
Grundfos pumps India Pvt., Ltd., was established on March 13th, 1998. Grundfos India is
working with Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) to get a platinum certification of its
Green Factory Building.
Mission
“Grundfos is one of the world’s foremost pump manufacturers and it is their mission-the
basis of their existence- to successfully develop, produce and sell high-quality pumps and
pumping systems all over the world, contributing to a better quality of life and a healthy
environment.”

Vision
“Their vision-the future they are motivated for-is that: Their customer acknowledges
Grundfos as the leading producer and partner when it comes to high-quality pumps-both in
terms of performance and environment. Their employees thrive and make obvious their
satisfaction because their jobs and working condition provide them with great opportunities
for professional and personal growth and development. In addition, their satisfaction stems
from a good work environment that takes the individual’s requests and qualifications into
consideration. The rest of society recognizes and regards Grundfos with respect as a result of
their responsible conduct in relation to the laws of the society, the principles of democracy,
local traditions and the environment-as well as their relations with the people whose lives
and circumstance they handle

Objective
“To sustain the image of market leader in terms of product quality and service and to be
recognized by the customer as the India pump company and to achieve to became one of the
top five players in India.”

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4.0 Selection of Green Building
Grundfos like their products, product innovation, in-house production process, usage
and fondness of materials and new technologies highlight their sincere desire on World's
conservation, with nominal impact on the surrounding environment.
Hence, it is a logical turn for Grundfos India when it built its new facility in March
2005, as 'Green Building' in Chennai which symbolizes its core values and the encouraging
way they wished to conduct their business in India. Green building concentrates on energy
efficiency by paying attention to vital areas like air-condition, lighting energy efficient
appliances, building envelope and by implementing best waste management practices.
The decision to build green and have the building certified as the India’s first Gold
Rated building under LEED has been of great importance to Grundfos India. The green
building has attracted constant interest among architects, contractors, developers and others.
Every year, the building has more than 2,500 visitors, who want to know more about the
concept behind green buildings and who seek inspiration.
5.0 Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)
LEED provides framework for estimating building performance and meeting
sustainability goals. LEED emphasizes state-of-the-art strategies for sustainable site
development, water savings, energy efficiency, material selection and indoor environmental
quality on the basis of well- founded scientific standards.
Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) has been the initiative of Confederation of
Indian Industry (CII) for promoting green buildings in India. The vision of the IGBC is to
serve as a single point service provider and be a key engine to facilitate all green buildings in
India.
The Leadership in Energy and Environment Design Green building rating system is a
nationally and internationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation
of high performance green buildings. To facilitate the adoption of green building practices
relevant to the local climate and regional practices, IGBC is working on the development of
new rating programs. The launch of the ‘IGBC Green Homes’ rating system is an important
step in this direction.
5.1 Rating System in LEED
LEED rating for new construction and major renovations for commercial buildings
there are 69 possible points and buildings can qualify for four levels of certification viz.,
Platinum (52-69 points) Gold (39-51 points) Silver (33-38 points) Certified (26-31points)
LEED-India started in the year 2003 with three types of rating systems viz., for new

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constructions (Government and corporate sector); for Core and shell (Malls, IT parks etc.) and
for Green Homes (Residential). Out of possible 69 points, Grundfos achieved 42 points
thereby achieving GOLD LEED rating.
6.0 Functions
Grundfos has made it an objective to be a truly global company by 2025, to employ
75,000 people and to increase their business activities radically. Therefore, a footprint
strategy was launched in 2009 for the purpose of reducing Grundfos negative impact on the
climate. The ambition with the footprint strategy is to never emit more CO 2 than in 2008. The
strategy focuses on reducing CO2 emissions caused by their own manufacturing processes,
building operations and logistics, including the transport of goods and people between their
operations as well as from and to suppliers and customers. To minimize water requirement for
irrigation and uprooting and re-planting of 'the already existing trees' within the premises
native plants are used
Exhibit 2: Traits of Green Building

High efficiency irrigation system like sprinklers for lawn and drip irrigation for trees
and shrubs are used, charging facility for battery operated vehicle's, ensuring zero discharge
to municipal drainage by using rainwater recharge pits and with the creation of no smoking
zones all over the building, the Grundfos Green building have shown their respect and
concern towards the environment.
Architects of Green Building
V.V. Architects Pvt. Ltd. played the hand in constructing Grundfos green building. Vineeta
Badawe the Manager of V.V. Architects Pvt. Ltd was the in charge of the green design line in
the Grundfos building. Because of their work with Grundfos, they have become known as ‘the
green architects’ or ‘the Grundfos architects’. After working with Grundfos, they have
undertaken many jobs for the corporate sector, private contractors and architects who want
to know more about green architecture. Their company has therefore been in charge of the
design of several buildings, including Turbo Energy Ltd’s, German SEW-Eurodrive’s
industrial factory, the Titan Industries' Innovation Centre, Vestas Wind Energy’s factory in
Chennai and Parker Hannifin from the US.

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7.0 Strategies of Grundfos Green building
Grundfos have achieved 42 points out of 69 points in LEED rating leading to be certified
as the First Gold Rated Green Building in India. Grundfos managed to score four out of five
in innovation and design process and 12 out of 15 in indoor environmental quality. However,
they were able to achieve five out of 17 points in energy and atmosphere category.
Table I: Points achieved by Grundfos for their Green Building under LEED rating.

The construction of a Gold Rated Green building helped Grundfos to save 25 per cent
on the total energy consumption and to reduce 43 per cent in the total water consumption in
2009. In order to increase the reliability of delivery and improve the possibility of meeting
requirements made to pump solutions locally, the group is continuously developed through
decentralization of production, establishment of new sales and service companies and the
establishment of regional research and development units.
Exhibit 3: Research and Development Cost of Grundfos

Source: GRUNDFOS Annual Report 2008 (Jensen, 2008)

Some of the features of Grundfos Green building at Chennai show the genuine
concern towards sustainability. By using double skin brick wall having 25mm air cavity and
double-glazed low U glass heat emission into the building is minimized.

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Exhibit 4: Function of Double Glazed Low U Glasses and Interior of Grundfos

Hydro Fluoro Carbon (HFC) based Chillers with a high Co-efficient of performance
and with thermal storage system to minimize peak and connected load. Continuous
monitoring and maintaining fresh air by effective CO2 level monitoring through Sensors,
installed at key locations of the building is a very important feature of the Green Building.
Exhibit 5: Environment of Grundfos and double skin brick wall

The entire building has been planned to harvest 79.76% of natural day light and 95%
of space has direct access view of outdoors providing connection to the exteriors.
Exhibit 6: Co2 monitoring sensors and thermal storage system

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Less usage of low Volatile Organic Compounds like sealant, carpets, and composite woods
paints to reduce air pollution and to maintain good indoor air quality. The main feature of the
Grundfos Green building which makes it different from other buildings is that 10% of the
building materials used for the construction have highly recycled contents like Aluminum,
Steel, Glass, Brick, Fly ash cement and are salvaged from old offices to minimize the use of
virgin materials. Usage of dual flush toilet, sensor based urinals, waterless urinals are used to
reduce water consumption. Rain water recharge pits have been constructed to improve the
ground water level. The company provides recharging facilities and changing facilities for
battery operated vehicles and bicyclists respectively.
Exhibit 7: sprinklers, dual flush and sensor based urinals and vehicle recharging facility

8.0 Merits of Grundfos Green building

Its Green Building in Chennai show their respect and concern towards the
environment. They have constructed the Green Building with double skin brick wall with
25mm air cavity in order to reduce the heat load inside the building. Double-glazed low U
glass has been used in the key areas of the building. Due to the efficient architectural
construction day light is used 95% of the time. They have reduced 38% in water consumption.
They also reduced energy consumption and CO2 emission. They reduced the electricity
consumption from 25% in 2008 to 15% in 2009.

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Exhibit 8: Power consumption and water consumption trend

Source: Building on ‘green savings’ Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Sunday, Jun 07, 2009 (R.Balaji, 2009)
They have reduced 60% of hazardous waste. 10% of old salvaged materials were used
for new constructions. Almost 60% of the materials used in the building are having highly
recycled contents. The sustainable energy management efforts pulled down the island effect.
The firm is able to achieve sustained savings of 12% due to optimized life cycle economic
performance. The project is eco-friendly, financially feasible and technologically sound. .
Meeting the green building standards meant that at Rs 6.4 crore the project was 10 per cent
more expensive as compared to a conventional building of its kind.
(Balaji, Building on ‘green savings’, 2009)
9.0 Achievements of Grundfos Green Building.
Grundfos has acquired a large number of prizes and awards through the years.
Grundfos was the award winner of EFQM (The European Foundation for Quality
Management) in 2006. The award was given by the EFQM, a joint organization for all
companies working with the Business Excellence model. Grundfos also received two special
awards for Corporate Social Responsibility and People Development and Involvement. In
2005 Grundfos was placed on the list of the 100 best workplaces in Europe.
Grundfos received Quality Certification ISO 9001:2000, Environmental Certification
ISO 14001 EMAS-registration.
9.1 Future plans of Grundfos
For further expansion, Grundfos had acquired 16 acres of land near Sriperumbudur for
the construction of an additional production facility for meeting increased domestic demand.
The work is expected to commence by 2011.
10.0 Conclusion
To accelerate the Green Building Movement, the following actions are essential.
Corporate sector should feel the moral responsibility to promote the cause of environment

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conservation for the benefit of future generations. Municipal corporations should set internal
standards for green buildings within their limits. It is necessary to make next generation more
aware regarding efficient use of energy resources and create platform to show the Green
Building materials and equipment to general public as awareness program. The government
should give incentives for constructing green buildings and to the manufacturers of green
material and equipment and bring awareness among the masses through electronic media and
press. In addition to these, GUT (Grand Unified Theory) technology also becomes helping
tool for Pollution free Environment. By adapting GUT technology they can accelerate Green
Building Movement to a considerable extent. The advantageous applications of GUT
technology includes free energy power plant fueled by dark-to-visible matter conversion,
magnetic hover bus power regenerator, electric and motor that deliver more power than input.
Grundfos vision for the coming years is still to develop greater sustainability within all
business areas. This includes the design of sustainable products with the lowest possible life
cycle costs, a continuously decreasing CO2 burden per manufactured and sold unit. They are
extremely focused on ensuring that Grundfos maintains the position as the leading company
within clean tech pump solutions for green and energy efficient buildings and on ensuring that
Grundfos becomes one of the worlds’s leading companies within innovative system solutions
which supply quality water to the world’s growing population at a competitive price.
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R.Balaji. (2009, june 7). Building on ‘green savings’ . Building on ‘green savings’ .
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(n.d.). Retrieved from www.LEED.com: http://www.usgbc.org/DisplayPage.aspx?
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[email protected]

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