While the name, SPX Cooling Technologies, has only been in use since 2005, the company that bears this title actually possesses over a century of experience, during which time it has become amalgamated with some the best known names within the cooling industry including Marley, Ceramic, Recold and Hamon Dry Cooling. This has resulted in the company possessing more than 250 global patents in the power generation, industrial, refrigeration and HVAC markets.
Originally founded in Germany in 1894, Balcke & Co. as it was then known, quickly went about becoming a world leader in cooling towers during the early 1900s. Marley, meanwhile, was founded in the US in 1922, first as the Power Plant Equipment Company before becoming The Marley Company in 1926. Marley would go on to invent and patent most of the industrial cooling tower innovations and technologies that remain so vital to this day. It is this legacy that means that Marley Mexicana remains the only entity left within the SPX Group to retain its original name, that and the fact that the brand has been known in Mexico now for more than 50 years.
Drawing its strength across its operations from the unmatched quality of its products, SPX Cooling Technologies today boasts more than 150 offices, subsidiaries and partners across the planet, providing it with both a global reach and local presence in core markets that allows in to deliver the solutions its customers require quickly.
The company first opened its Mexico office, from which Marley Mexicana continues to operate, in 1960. Ever since it has been the leading regional force when it comes to cooling tower technology and sales, and has been responsible for installing towers into many of the country’s most important power plants on behalf of Comision Federal de Electricidad and Petroleos Mexicanos.
It is in Mexico that the company have noticed that in the last five years in particular there has been a considerable increase in interest from customers requesting access to material and equipment that doesn’t just exceed their expectations in terms of quality, but which also decreases pollution and toxic residues.
There is certainly a growing culture within the country of companies looking to be more sustainable and environmentally conscious, one that has increased as the Mexican energy sector has expanded in value. Fortunately for those in possession of such ethics, Marley Mexicana has long been known as a reliable supplier of cooling towers and air cooled condensers specifically designed to lower pollution and increase efficiency.
Promoting sustainable energy production is a trait that the company has long striven to possess and is encapsulated in the fact that SPX Cooling Technologies is proud to be a member of the US Green Building Council and is an advocate of the LEED Program, a voluntary, consensus-based national standard for developing high-performance, sustainable buildings. Evaporative cooling is a central strategy for green building design due to its energy savings and low environmental impact. Also, water treatment strategies to minimise make-up and blow-down can offer the potential to gain water resource credits in LEED.
The LEED Program in itself is linked closely to the ASHRAE 90.1 Energy Standard for Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings, a US standard that provides minimum requirements for energy efficient designs for buildings. LEED sets the ASHRAE 90.1 efficiency as the threshold for compliance before a building can even be considered for receiving LEED credits. These credits are subsequently granted based on improvements in overall building energy efficiency that are better than ASHRAE 90.1.
Towers that are selected larger in physical size with energy efficiency in gallons per minute per horsepower above ASHRAE 90.1 can help a company to acquire LEED credits. The use of variable frequency drives (VFDs) can also enable significant annual energy savings in most climates, which also can help to enable LEED credits. Marley Mexicana’s Tower Sizing and Selection tools are able to assist its clients by providing the ASHRAE efficiency calculation on the output of each selection.
As part of the Green Building Council the company can also supply its customers with the Green Building water calculator. This solution easily allows a company to determine water usage values such as evaporation, drift, blow down, and total water usage by simply adjusting operating conditions like total water flow, hot water temperature, cold water temperature, wet-bulb temperature, drift rate, and concentrations to match each individual scenario.
The energy sector in Mexico finds itself at a key point in its evolution. This is perhaps best emphasised in the moves that have been made this year by the country’s President, Enrique Peña Nieto to reform the energy sector. This culminated in early September when a bill of amendments calling for the overhaul of the sector was submitted to Mexico’s Congress. The bill itself is seen as the beginning of a series of changes to federal legislation governing the sector and sets out the basis for a new perspective on its operation.
Rather than being fearful of change, Marley Mexicana are embracing the prospect of serious reforms being made to the energy industry, recognising that they present the possibility of more opportunities for companies like it that are part funded by foreign capital. With a renewed focus on the industry being driven by government it stands to reason that investment will be made in new power plants and infrastructure within the country, and coupled with the increase in demand for environmentally friendly solutions, this will directly benefit the likes of Marley Mexicana.
Written by Will Daynes, research by Jeff Abbott
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