World Cement - November 2018

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of Things (IIoT) monitoring are the early warnings of
assets beginning to have operational issues. These small
issues can be addressed before more expensive repairs
may be required and possibly significant downtime
is experienced. Generally, significant savings in
operational and maintenance expenses are achieved.
IIoT monitoring can embed a document
management system into its IIoT solution. All drawings,
manuals, and even repair videos can be housed within
the system so that plant personnel can access vital
documentation within a moment’s notice. In normal
plant environments, plant maintenance personnel may
have to access multiple sites before work can begin.
With a centralised system, documents can be viewed
on any smart phone, tablet, or PC. Digital twin imagery
can display the exact environment with dashboards, so
that all operation data can be seen by plant personnel
instantaneously. This can dramatically increase speed to
repair and reduce asset downtime.
Cement companies can monitor any vital asset
with IIoT monitoring. Those that do will find
significant maintenance savings and increased
production, while maintenance can change from a
reactive to a proactive scenario.
Conclusion
Dosing of both chemicals and dry product can be
harsh and high-wear in cement production. Cement
companies should always strive to find the best
equipment possible to deliver reliable cost-effective
production. Monitoring via the IIoT is now available
to help. Significant operational costs can be reduced,
profitability increased, and production gains can be
achieved. Many cement companies are unsure what
solution to choose for IIoT monitoring. To begin
IIoT monitoring, the investment does not have to
be a plant-wide system. An excellent target for IIoT
monitoring can be safety, compliance, high value
assets, or assets that cause the most downtime or
maintenance costs. IIoT solutions can be extremely
flexible and adaptable to monitor various assets.
A cement facility may find extremely different IIoT
solutions and pricing. Instrumentation has decreased
substantially and much valuable information can be
captured with relatively inexpensive instrumentation.
Investing in one or many IIoT monitoring solutions is
recommended to begin to capture and understand
the benefits and weaknesses of various offerings. The
sooner a business starts, the more prepared it will
be to protect operating margins and improve plant
reliability.
About the author
Todd Loudin is President of Flowrox’s North American
operations and has been with Flowrox for 24 years. He is also
Vice President of Global Sales.
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