Pump-energy optimisation — the CRC verification story

This line is the experimental backbone behind EVOLV’s biggest energy prize. In 2022 the R&D team built the machineGroupControl algorithm — the Carbon Reducing Controller (CRC) — that decides how to run a group of pumps at the lowest energy cost. The obvious questions followed: is it actually right, and how do we safely roll it out?

Everything on this line exists to answer that. A series of studies — many with Avans and TU/e students — independently checked the algorithm from every angle: parallel pumping, series pumping, the effect of suction and differential pressure, predictive-maintenance side-effects, an edge-hardware build, and finally a field test on a real gemaal. Together they confirm the CRC approach holds up and map out how to put it into production on pumping stations.

The energy savings themselves are booked on EVOLV’s machineGroupControl node (>€1M/yr potential); this line is the verification + rollout track, so it carries no separate savings to avoid double-counting.