Some important roles and responsibilities of Energy Management Cell are given below:

(a) Forecasting Energy ( electricity, steam and fuel) consumption: Planning of the energy system operation, based on the forecast need for electricity and steam, can be carried out minute by minute, hourly, daily, several weeks or months in advance. Various forecasting methods are available today, depending on the type of energy consumer and unique customer needs. Leading energy management solutions today include the ability to automatically derive load forecasts from a mill's production plan.

Real-time, historical and forecast data can be managed through real time databases, developed specifically for demanding industrial applications. All information, including historical values and forecasts, can be shown on the screen in the same view. Users can move data to their desktop applications by cut-and-paste operations. Data can also be accessed using standard SQL commands.

(b) Maximizing cost efficiency by load scheduling and optimizing energy generation: Companies strive to optimize energy both from operational and financial perspectives. Energy needs are fulfilled by the most economical combination of the company's own production resources, and electricity and fuel purchased through bilateral agreements and the open market. Service outages and transfer costs can be taken into account in the optimization. These solutions may also optimize the use of hydro-power resources and scheduling of main consumers.

(c) Managing electricity purchase and sales: Companies today can record purchase and sales agreements with price information and collect the data of purchased and sold amounts to be used for billing. Energy management solutions consider existing sales and purchase agreements in the optimization calculations. They also support decision making in the open electricity market through simulation of sales and purchase transactions, and by indicating the company's generation costs relative to the market price. Depending on the market interfaces, bids and offers may be automatically exchanged with the market operator.

(d) Monitoring and controlling peak loads, energy balance and efficiency: Process information, obtained from various data acquisition systems, including OCS, SCADA and PIMS, or process databases, can be processed and managed by a real time database.

Communication methods can vary from standard ODBC or OPC interfaces to dedicated interface modules, depending on the system and the user needs. Existing measurements are normally sufficient, and new instrumentation can be added if needed. Tie-line monitoring tracks the amount of purchased energy and provides peak load control. Displays can show the integral purchase from the beginning of the monitoring period, as well as point out the available purchase contracts and prices, and a prediction of the integral consumption and the marginal price at the end of the monitoring period. This can help users determine which consumers can be shed to avoid excess usage of expensive electricity during peak load time.

(e) Supporting decision making with simulation, real-time tools and "what-if" analysis: By using simulation in combination with the optimization model, the effects of variations in system parameters can be studied. Such parameters may include electricity and steam consumption, prices of electricity and fuels, and availability of fuels and generation units.

Real-time monitoring and reporting functions include basic on-line calculations, such as energy balances, efficiencies and other performance figures, consumption of fuels and chemicals, and emissions. Energy balance and consumption data is used for cost tracking to allocate the energy cost to users.

(f) Choosing an Energy Management Solution: Companies careful to choose an energy management solution that works for them will be in the best position to reduce energy risks and capitalize on opportunities. The following are characteristic of what a company should look for in energy management:

Customizable energy management software, depending on the user needs. A suite of energy management tools able to be mixed and matched for a total energy management solution to suit the specific needs of any company. Energy management and optimization solutions that are tailorable for one mill, or configurable to coordinate the energy operations of an entire corporation with several sites in different regions. Solutions that apply in a chemical-pulping environment with chemical recovery boilers, as with a TMP plant heat recovery system. System architecture that includes a database server that connects to the company's data network, and user-interface client software in PC workstations, giving every user individual access rights to information.

These fully integrated solutions exist today. Effective energy management involves understanding energy needs and meeting those needs at the lowest possible cost in a way that suits each individual customer. Through effective energy management, companies increase profits, reduce costs and create more value.