Plant reliability is evolving into an important focus area for production and operation heads in both discrete and process manufacturing industries. With global market dynamics shifting and supply chain-wide efficiencies becoming crucial for maintaining competitive advantage; manufacturers are investing in initiatives and strategies that can make their production environments more productive and reliable. Naturally, the market for predictive maintenance, potentially the biggest enabler of reliability objectives, is growing exponentially.
By the end of 2022, global investments in predictive maintenance are estimated to reach USD 5.86 Bn and continue to grow at a rate of 30.67% CAGR. While North America is presently the biggest market for predictive maintenance and reliability solutions, the Middle East and Asia Pacific are the fastest-growing markets, poised to be the growth hubs of tomorrow. Amidst such promising developments, the cement industry remains a front-runner and prominent adopter of predictive maintenance solutions.
Predictive Maintenance in Cement Plants
Predictive maintenance (PdM) is a maintenance approach that entails the use of cloud-enabled technologies to monitor diverse assets involved in production and estimate maintenance needs on the basis of asset conditions and detected anomalies. Industrial assets are monitored in real-time using advanced condition-based monitoring (CBM) techniques. Edge diagnostics and vibration analysis are subsequently deployed to determine the state of assets and determine the presence of impending mechanical faults such as:
1. Structural and rotational looseness
2. Stiffness and unbalance
3. Heightened friction due to lack of lubrication
4. Misalignment and insufficient clearance
5. Coupling and gear defects
6. Bearing faults and failure
With the timely diagnosis of equipment faults, predictive analytics also perform root cause analysis to provide insights about underlying causes and guide decision-making about maintenance planning. OEM inspections can be more targeted and the time to source and replace machine components can be reduced with access to the right information. In the cement industry, where even an hour of unplanned downtime due to equipment failure can translate into as much as $100,000 of losses in revenue, focused application of PdM could mean savings of millions of dollars.
However, plant maintenance and digitalization teams responsible for automating maintenance processes must assess mission-critical equipment and applications before adopting the predictive maintenance approach. Here are some of the most significant applications in cement production that can be monitored in real-time with PdM solutions and made more reliable.
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