FACILITY OPTIMIZATION In-House Training at CORAL BAY NICKEL CORP., Palawan, Philippines

Engr. Lope Columna conducted an In-House Training on FACILITY OPTIMIZATION (Coal-Fired Power Plant, Boiler and Steam Utilization, Compressed-Air, etc.) for the Refinery Plant of CORAL BAY Nickel Corporation in Rio Tuba, Bataraza, Palawan, Philippines. 

Coral Bay Nickel Corporation operates a Hydrometallurgical Processing Plant (HPP) to produce nickel and cobalt sulfide from existing stockpiles of low grade nickel ores from the Rio Tuba nickel mine of Rio Tuba Nickel Mining Corporation.

This Efficiency Course was conducted last December 12-14, 2018 for the First Group of Participants; and December 17-19, 2018 for the 2nd Group of Participants.

REQUESTED TOPICS Are The Following: 

1. Pre-Drying Coal High Moisture Content.
2. Opportunities for Compressed-Air Optimization (Key Energy saving areas). 
3. The 14 R's of compressed air efficiency. 
4. Waste heat recovery and importance of maintenance. 
5. Identifying the electrical cost of compressed air.  
6. Co-generation of energy. 
7. Recycle of Power (Heat, Steam, Pressure).
   

SOME OF THE SUBJECTS DISCUSSED ARE THE FOLLOWING:

The 14 R’s of Compressor Efficiency

1. Reduce leakage losses. 
2. Reduce pressure at points of use. 
3.  Reduce pressure at source (compressors). 
4. Reduce system pressure fluctuations using adequately sized and located air receivers and controls. 
5. Reduce number of partially loaded compressors to only one. 
6. Remove inappropriate applications. 
7. Reduce system pressure drop losses with properly sized piping and valves. 
8. Remove moisture content of compressed air with the proper type and size of dryers. 
9. Remove condensate without loss of compressed air. 
10. Reduce downtime through preventive maintenance. 
11. Record system data and maintenance. 
12. Review air usage patterns regularly. 
13. Recover heat. 
14. Reduce energy costs (return on investment and cost of operation).
    

The FORGOTTEN BASICS OF MAINTENANCE ARE INCLUDED IN THE EFFICIENCY COURSE

A survey of more than 2,000 seminar attendees conducted over a two-year period were asked what situations contribute to Machine Breakdown that are related to Basic Maintenance.  

The following Maintenance Basics are precisely where many Maintenance Training Programs fail to focus. Thus, COLUMNA ENERGY CONSULTING included the BASICS highlighted in the survey that fall within the Three (3) main categories:

1. Equipment CLEANLINESS.
2. Proper FASTENING procedures.
3. Proper LUBRICATION procedures.

BUILDING (HOTEL) EFFICIENT MANAGEMENT Course For RED PLANET Hotels

The COLUMNA ENERGY CONSULTING, via Engr. LOPE COLUMNA conducted an In-House Training on BUILDING (Hotels) EFFICIENT MANAGEMENT for RED PLANET Hotels Technical Personnel. This was held last November 22-23, 2018, at their Makati Hotel at Amorsolo, 99 Urban Avenue, Brgy. Pio Del Pilar, Makati City, Metro Manila.

What is EFFICIENT MAINTENANCE MANAGEMENT?

EFFICIENT Maintenance Management is the efficient and effective planning and execution of tasks performed to maintain the Operation of Equipment, Vehicles, and Facilities in an Efficient Way. It spans many diverse functions and responsibilities, ranging from designing maintenance Jobs and Procedures to providing and managing the resources needed to complete the work. 
 
To successfully plan a maintenance procedure, you need accurate information on equipment to be maintained, it's components, and ongoing production or workload requirements. The maintenance skills and time available must be matched against the workload and equipment availability. Parts and supplies must be anticipated and procured in advance.

Why is Maintenance Management Important?

Competition

With competitive marketplace pressures increasing, business owners and managers are striving to find new and better ways to contain and control the costs of doing business. As a result of economic pressures, an area long neglected - plant equipment maintenance management - is becoming recognized as another potentially productive, profitable field of management.
Today's manager's are focusing on all operations with the goal of cutting costs and improving the efficiency of maintenance and engineering departments. 

Plant and Building Complexity

Today's plant’s and buildings are becoming more automated, and automation adds to complexity. In industrial/commercial buildings, healthcare facilities and campus labs, automated HVAC, electrical, electronic and pneumatic systems, auxilary power, and special environmental technologies are proliferating. The potential cost of breakdowns to these critical systems is becoming an increasing risk to plant management. Reduced staffs are being asked to do more with increasingly complex buildings.

Potential Savings

The potential costs of doing nothing are high. Industry statistics show that billions of dollars are spent annually to maintain physical plants, commercial buildings, educational and healthcare facilities and equipment. Over one-third of all the dollars spent on maintenance are wasted due to poor or inadequate maintenance management.

The associated costs of breakdown do not stop with equipment repair and replacement - there are also the realities of unproductive downtime, lost business, displacement of building occupants, uneven workloads, overtime, and emergency inventory purchasing.

Old Methods Provide Limited Benefits

Historically, most systems for managing maintenance activities have been manual. Everything from index cards, to memo files, to wall-mounted log charts. These outdated methods were cumbersome, incomplete, and inefficient, and were generally used inconsistently, further reducing any minimal benefits they were intended to provide. Computer-aided maintenance management is a much more reliable and better overall maintenance tracking system. 

With this in mind, let's focus on the basic components needed to successfully manage this maintenance business. Consider the following points for your consideration:

MAINTENANCE PLANNING 

Develop a master plan mission of the maintenance department. It should be a road map that contains clear directions for maintaining and periodically upgrading the facility and that defines desirable frequencies of occurrence. for facility upgrading. 

WORK ORDER SYSTEM

Without that you are going nowhere. Make sure your work order system is followed meticulously and schedules and controls the allocation of manpower, funds and equipment for daily/weekly/monthly routine work in a way that minimizes delays and ensures trouble-free plant operation.

EQUIPMENT HISTORY 

Development a complete repair and maintenance history for each piece of machinery. Besides acting as a record, this will indicate trends and pinpoint areas of concern. 

MATERIAL AND COST CONTROL

Keep parts inventory as low as possible, but make sure proper material is available when required. This is often a judgment call, but the experience of parts stockers and good equipment history data can help here. Monitor maintenance expenses and compare to forecasts and budget. Ensure that all invoices go through the maintenance department to keep control of spending. If bills for contract maintenance go directly to accounts payable, you are not in control.

PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT 

In order to manage you must control. In order to control you must measure -- and have the results available as management tools. If you have all of the above and cannot measure the effects, you won't achieve successful maintenance management.

Measuring labor performance tells you how well a group performs while working, compared to a pre-established job standard. The lowest level of measurement is the work order. But always measure a group. There are no personal incentives for maintenance. It is a team effort, not a one-man show. 

Therefore, don't measure individual performance. Measuring maintenance productivity tells you how well the maintenance department is performing in total, again compared to a pre-established job standard.