Northumberland business Calibrate scoops renewables award

The firm, based near Belford, installs and maintains commercial renewable technologies, but on this occasion, worked with a client to re-engineer an old and underperforming system installed by a third party and re-imagined it back to peak performance, saving hundreds of thousands of pounds on energy bills.

Susie McDonald, co-founder of Calibrate, speaking after winning the Non-Domestic Heat Pump Project category, said: “We are thrilled to have been recognised yet again at these awards, especially as they are very specific to our industry and recognise the highest level of knowledge and expertise.

“As a pioneering business in the industry, visibility like this helps us to get closer to our vision of making net zero a reality for businesses through innovative technologies.”

Calibrate worked with the client, a poultry stronghold of 300,000 broilers with a significant 10-year contract supplying a major supermarket chain, to bring the business’s heat pump back to its former glory.

With a high reliance on on-demand and consistent heat for the chickens, to safeguard and future-proof the enterprise, the client needed to get the technology back to peak performance.

Calibrate stepped in to show how their bespoke software platform, could evaluate how energy costs and carbon could be slashed through an investment in engineering works that were projected to save £117,000 per year.

The innovation of this reworks project lay in Calibrate’s own intelligent bespoke controller (Calibrate Analyser), which also found a place in the ACR finals.

Like a domestic Hive controller but on a larger scale, this tool allows remote access and energy monitoring ensuring the highest energy efficiencies are obtained reducing costs and carbon emissions and can also simulate savings and benefits of future renewable projects such as solar, wind and hydrogen.

Emma Tandy, Calbibrate marketing manager, said: “We were against some strong competition in the industry, so it was a great honour to be a winner again.

“With energy costs as they are, our aim is to help companies to implement solutions to reduce their energy costs and positively impact on the environment to secure a more sustainable and profitable future for their business. We are so pleased as this accolade recognises that vision.”