The energy year 2024 at a glance
Looking at 2024, it is fundamentally positive that energy savings were once again achieved across all company locations within the Kuhn Group. However, a direct comparison with previous years reveals a clearly differentiated picture in detail. This is due to several special effects that came to bear in 2024. Continue reading
It is pleasing to note that both total electricity and heating gas consumption at the Radevormwald site were once again significantly reduced. With savings of 397,944 kWh of electricity and 53,240 kWh of heating gas, Radevormwald achieved energy savings equivalent to the average annual consumption of around 100 single-family homes with 4-person households (electricity) and 2 single-family homes (gas) (1).
However, the reduction in total electricity consumption correlates with a simultaneous decrease in casting tonnage, meaning that this saving was largely production-dependent and less measure-driven than in previous years.
In addition, 12,816 liters of diesel fuel were saved by switching from diesel-powered forklifts to electric models. With an average consumption of 7 liters per 100 km for a passenger car (2), this corresponds to a mileage of around 183,000 km – in simple terms: a trip around the world about four and a half times.
At our Sörup site significant savings were achieved too, particularly in district heating. Here, consumption fell by 566,980 kWh, which is roughly equivalent to the average annual consumption of around 40 single-family homes (3). The measures implemented by facility management in summer 2024 began to bear fruit here. A simultaneous slight increase in feed-in (+3 % compared to the previous year) resulted in a net reduction in district heating requirements of 21 %.
By contrast, total gas consumption at M. Jürgensen increased by around 21%. However, this increase in consumption can be explained by production factors, as the number of molds preheated with gas also increased by 26 % in the same period.
Finally, a look at the performance of our photovoltaic system: 2024 was the second full year in which we produced electricity from our own PV system (see Newsroom article). However, the changeable weather, especially in May and June, meant that electricity yields were 2% lower than in 2023.
Nevertheless, the system produced an impressive 1,378,686 kWh in total. Here, too, it is worth comparing the amount of electricity generated with the average consumption of 345 single-family homes with a 4-person household. A medium-sized village could be completely supplied with electricity with this amount. We consumed 1,099,548 kWh of this directly ourselves at our Radevormwald site, which corresponds to a self-consumption rate of around 80 %. The remaining 279,138 kWh were fed into the public electricity grid.
Converted into CO₂ emissions, the PV system avoided around 740 tons of CO₂ in 2024. Based on the average per capita emissions caused by each person in Germany per year, this corresponds to just over 100 people (4).
Overall, the Kuhn Group companies will once again have a very presentable energy and climate balance for 2024. However, it has also become clear that there are certain topics and areas that we must and will work on in the coming months – but as an energy-intensive company, this is a matter of course for us anyway.
(1) With an assumed electricity consumption of 4,000 kWh/a and an assumed natural gas consumption of 23,000 kWh/a. For comparison see e.g: https://www.co2online.de/energie-sparen/strom-sparen/strom-sparen-stromspartipps/stromverbrauch-im-haushalt https://www.thermondo.de/info/rat/gas/gasverbrauch-einfamilienhaus (2) Source: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/bild/durchschnittlicher-kraftstoffverbrauch-von-pkw (3) Source: https://www.stadtwerke-muenster.de/wissen/fernwaerme/verbrauch-abrechnung (4) Source: https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/167877/umfrage/co-emissionen-nach-laendern-je-einwohner