How Much Could A Smart Valve Island Save You?

26 June 2025 | IMI Norgren

• Automation & Robotics
• Machinery, Tooling, Production- and Safety Equipment

downloadFor editorial use only

With energy prices on the rise, industrial manufacturers and OEMs are under more pressure than ever to optimise their operations. Every component needs to work perfectly. Downtime needs to be minimised – and unplanned downtime needs to be almost eliminated.

How smart Valve Islands cut energy spend, reduce faults, and give you a new competitive advantage

With energy prices on the rise, industrial manufacturers and OEMs are under more pressure than ever to optimise their operations.

Every component needs to work perfectly. Downtime needs to be minimised – and unplanned downtime needs to be almost eliminated.

That’s particularly true for any facility that’s looking to deliver outstanding results, whether that means driving innovation, keeping up with busy production lines, or keeping critical processes and vital systems running smoothly.

Optimising the performance of your valve island technology is a powerful way to cut down on inefficiencies and, in the process, take control of your energy costs.

In this blog, we’ll outline how the latest digital valve island technology can help you: Become more flexible; Drive connectivity; Reduce the complexity of your systems; Make your pneumatic systems more reliable

What is a Valve Island?

A valve island – sometimes called a valve manifold – is a component made up of several individual valves, connected and mounted together with a single air supply and a common exhaust.

Using a valve island is often significantly more efficient than using stand-alone valves. By reducing pipework and electrical connections, they simplify your system design. This makes assembly significantly easier – and reduces the chance that a faulty connection will affect the performance of your valves and result in downtime.

Modular valve islands are becoming popular for automation applications in a wide range of sectors, including food & beverage, machine tools, packaging, material handling, and paper production.

How Much Could A Smart Valve Island Save You?
How can a connected Valve Island solution upgrade your system performance?

Most systems waste about 20% of the compressed air they generate because of leaks and inefficiencies.

Considering that generating compressed air usually adds up to around 20% of a business’ total monthly energy bill, it just makes good business sense to reduce this wastage.

If you can use the latest valve island technology and detect compressed air inefficiencies across your entire pneumatic system, you’ll be able to prevent leaks and cut down on your energy usage. Which, in turn, can have a clear positive impact on your budget and your carbon footprint.

For example, reducing the operating pressure inside a compressed air system by just one bar can reduce your energy spend by an impressive 7%. In other words, these kinds of incremental improvements can create real, measurable change.

The latest valve islands use smart technology to identify and mitigate air leaks:

Connectivity - Valve islands equipped with IO-Link have built-in intelligence and processing power that allows you to track essential performance data. You can use this data to make accurate, robust operational decisions and identify areas of waste.

Real-time visibility - Valve islands can now be built with onboard displays on the PLC, or you can gather data through existing HMIs, or remotely via a PC or mobile phone. This gives you the status information you need to identify faults and uncover why they happen, so you can quickly resolve any issues.

Benefits of connected Valve Islands

Smart valve island technology can improve efficiency in three key ways.

Minimising process downtime and improving machine efficiency

Machine breakdowns are inconvenient, costly, and make it harder to achieve your production targets – and the longer a breakdown lasts, the greater the negative impact.

IO-Link technology can provide you with data-driven performance insights, alerting you if your component is at an increased risk of failure, helping you predict and avoid errors before they even occur. For example, a connected valve island can tell you when a solenoid coil needs to be changed – allowing you to fix the issue long before the valve island fails.

Reducing the complexity of machine build and design

You need components that allow you to create machines quickly, simply, and cost-effectively – that way, you’ll be able to reduce both hardware costs and technicians’ time.

The latest valve islands are modular, have a simpler design, and can be mounted in a variety of ways. This makes them easier to set up, remove, and reposition, significantly reducing the amount of time and money spent on each build.

Most importantly, this simplicity doesn’t force you to sacrifice flexibility or functionality. A modular valve island makes it easy to customise your configurations, valve functions, and connections.

Improving industrial automation system integration

Trying to integrate multiple products and sensing technologies into one solution can be a complex task for anyone involved in system design or motion control.

Building a complete system often means integrating elements from a wide range of manufacturers, all of which have slightly different specifications.

IO-Link technology is invaluable, allowing you to easily integrate all of your hardware and software into a single system. No matter the origin of the PLC, your IO-Link valve island will work seamlessly with other IO-Link products.

You’ll be able to quickly and confidently integrate and add numerous devices into one system. It’s a true “plug-and-play” approach to system design.

We offer a one-stop shop for flexible, high-performance valve islands

Whatever your system’s needs, we’ll provide the valve island solution you need to save costs, improve performance, and reduce your carbon footprint.

Our IO-Link enabled products give you data-driven, real-time insight into the performance and condition of critical components like valve islands, as well as wider pneumatic systems.

Right now, our solutions are helping to create powerful infrastructures that allow our industrial customers to better understand, manage, and follow their manufacturing processes.

We’re working on advancements that will make our valve islands core pieces of hardware, consolidating all of the data points you need to build a complete picture of your entire compressed air system. This gives you the insight you need to optimise the entire process – and, by doing so, take your performance improvements to the next level.