Saving more than water Water conservation:
Cranston Print Works, Webster
By Ed Hilow

Water conservation is more than just an environmental achievement for Cranston Print Works. It is a major factor for the historic textile mill’s survival in New England.

One of the oldest textile mills in the country, Cranston Print Works is reaping the benefits of a water conservation effort that not only saves 110 million gallons of water a year, but also saves the company about $350,000 annually.

Walking through Cranston Print Works’ Webster manufacturing facility, the sounds of machines humming and the smell of dyes and fabrics, makes you wonder what the textile industry must have been like at its peak in Massachusetts. Cranston Print Works has defied the competition pressures that beset the textile industry in the early part of the 20th century, driving most such mills to the South or out of business. Taking lessons from its own past, Cranston Print Works has changed itself from a chief contributor of pollution, as most textile mills were in the 1800s, into an environmental role model for modern manufacturing.

The company is headquartered in Cranston, RI, with design offices in New York City. It produces printed textiles used primarily in crafts, quilting, apparel and home décor. In all, it employs about 550 people and sells to such customers as Wal-Mart and Joanne’s Fabrics.

Overcoming employee skepticism

Thirty-six-year company veteran Richard Patrowicz, maintenance technician and leader of Cranston’s water conservation team, recalls when water conservation wasn’t a part of the company culture. Cranston does, however, have a long history of creating voluntary employee teams to address issues and problems. So it was no surprise when increasing water usage, coupled with rising sewerage costs, prompted the company to form a team to explore ways to reduce these costs by reusing and conserving water. “There was a time on weekends when hoses would be left running and there was no one even in the plant,” Patrowicz says. Now, water is viewed as a valuable commodity and the company mantra is “waste not, want not,” he says.

Cranston has been employee-owned since 1987, when its private owners decided to divest and set up an employee stock-ownership program. It’s obvious in talking with Patrowicz, along with Stephen Gable, CPW quality engineer; and Paul Aronian, CPW safety, hygiene and environmental services manager; that they take pride in their company’s success. All three are members of an eight-member, voluntary water conservation team established back in 1996.

Efforts to form a water conservation team were actually started in 1994, says Patrowicz, but they were met with strong resistance from nearly every department at the plant. “There wasn’t a department that wouldn’t be affected by our efforts,” he says, since water conservation touched most of the mill’s operation. No one was happy with the idea, he adds, of someone outside the department coming in to possibly change things.

The team, which consists of front-line workers and upper and middle management, wasn’t expected to last six months nor was it expected to accomplish much. Despite the resistance, the team evaluated the plant’s water usage and developed several projects to address it. The first project, one of 25 to follow, was the design and construction of a closed-loop system for cooling water for a singer, which burns lint off the surface of the cloth. This effort alone, done in January 1996, reduced the amount of water used annually by 8.3 million gallons and saved the company about $26,000. In testament to the company’s ingenuity, the system — which Patrowicz estimates cost $18,000 to make — was pieced together from unused and new equipment. A quote from a company that designs such systems indicated that it would have otherwise cost $50,000 easily, he says.

Big recycling benefits

Other conservation initiatives included installing timers and restrictors to control the flow of water, collecting and reusing condensation and steam, and automating some manual processes. As each new water conservation project came online, previously discarded water found new uses in other systems and the cost savings grew. “It has had a domino effect,” says Patrowicz. Although the team realizes there will always be a percentage of wastewater generated from operations, their goal is to come as close to 100 percent reuse as possible.

For the $125,000 the company has spent on water conservation projects overall, it has saved about $350,000 annually and has reduced its wastewater generation by 110 million gallons a year. While this is only about 1 percent of its operating costs, it still represents a significant cost savings. In all, the plant recycles between 60 percent and 70 percent of its water. The majority – about 90 percent – of Cranston’s cost savings comes from avoiding high sewer charges. From a daily sewer charge of as much as $8,000, it has dropped it to around $1,000 a day, according to Patrowicz.

The cost savings don’t even include reduced energy use, adds Gamble, that comes from reusing water. Originally, fabric was rinsed in a high-pressure washer with a lint-laden effluent discharged as wastewater. The process used 40 gallons a minute of water heated to 110 degrees. After evaluating the process, the team’s solution was to install a vibrating screen system, which removed lint and other impurities from the water and allowed the heated water to be reused. This not only reduced the amount of water that had to be heated, but it reduced wastewater to about 50 gallons an hour. And with cleaner water, downtime on equipment has been reduced dramatically because there are fewer clogs and breakdowns, says Gamble.

All this conservation has resulted in a reduction in the amount of wastewater generated from production. As of 1996, the amount of wastewater generated per wet yard of fabric was 1.2 gallons. By 2002, that amount fell to 0.7 gallons per yard. Cranston produces between 35 million to 40 million yards of fabric annually.

Setting an example for others

The company was able to devise many of its water conservation improvements with help from the Office of Technical Assistance, a branch of the Mass. Executive Office of Environmental Affairs. The OTA was so impressed by Cranston’s success, in May 2003 it published a case study highlighting its achievements.

“They’ve done an excellent job,” says Gus Ogunbameru, team leader for the textile industry for the OTA. The case study done on Cranston Print Works can raise the general awareness for others, says Ogunbameru, “when we can give them [business] some details that points them in the right direction, they can go out and do the same thing to the benefit of their own facility”

During the Industrial Revolution (1820-1870), textile mills were a backbone industry in Massachusetts. They created jobs and, for the first time, the concept of mass production. Less noble was the fact that the textile industry was also a chief contributor to pollution and the contamination of the Blackstone River on which many textile mills were built. Today, most of the textile mills are long gone, victims of competition from oversees manufacturers with cheaper labor and operation costs. Those textile mills that do remain in the state, have found special niches, says Ogunbameru. In the case of Cranston, efforts to cut costs and improve production have helped it remain here and have made environmental efforts an important part of its operation.

“A lot of companies can undertake, at the beginning when they’re trying to do pollution prevention, what I call easy solutions – some easy dos and don’ts,” Ogunbarmeru says. But, he categorizes Cranston’s efforts as “going to the next level” in reducing pollution and becoming more efficient. The payback isn’t immediate, but it will come in the long term.

Going to the next level

Cranston will continue working with the OTA on further refinements to its water conservation, Patrowicz says. One effort, called zero-liquid discharge, could eventually provide water treatment within the company’s system for constant re-use with little or no wastewater discharge.

Cranston’s water conservation team has come a long way since it was met with resistance and skepticism nine years ago. Now it’s sought out by others in the company to make improvements. Patrowicz says that there is certainly a self-enlightened interest in conservation efforts to make the company successful since it means preserving the company and jobs.

Aronian notes that the water conservation efforts are critical to the survival of CPW. Had such efforts not been implemented, he admits, the mill would be facing an uphill battle to significantly reduce costs in other areas.

The company is exploring additional water conservation efforts and is even looking at other environmental issues, such as co-generation of electricity, to further its cost savings and to further improve its water usage, says Patrowicz. Being the oldest running textile mill in the country hasn’t slowed down Cranston Prints Works’ enthusiasm to embrace new technology. And, when it comes to water conservation, Cranston has found that what’s good for the company is also good for the environment.

Taken from the Worcester Business Journal April 19, 2004