Cement, Energy and Environment

The Florida Rock facility sought Pavilion's Cement Grinding Control and Optimisation Solution as a way to truly optimize the finish mill process. Leveraging Pavilion's Model Predictive Control technology, the application continuously assesses current and predicted operational data, compares them to desired results, and computes new control targets to reduce process variability and improve overall performance. Florida Rock worked with Pavilion and its proven Value First® customer engagement methodology. Through this process, the two companies identified numerous variables that can affect the production process and developed the controller to fully utilize the mill's potential under existing system limitations. ValueFirst® helped the customer identify the following objectives: • Maintain product (Blaine and 325 within specifications. quality mesh) • Reduce process variability and improve operational stability. • Maximise fresh clinker feed rate subject to equipment constraints. • Reduce power consumption per tonne of cement. Results for the finishing mill included a 7.6 per cent increase in production, power consumption was reduced by 6.5per cent and controller utilization exceeded 95 per cent. Consistency in operations was improved and ROI was achieved on the Pavilion control application in one year. While Florida Rock's advanced control application has helped it run more consistently and efficiently - for longer time periods and with less manual input - personnel still recognized limitations with regards to Blaine or average particle fineness measurement and its correlation to cement strength. Results from an in-house laboratory study showed 1-day strength correlated more closely with key particle size parameters than it did with Blaine. The next logical step was to move to online particle size measurement. Malvern Instruments installed its online lnsitec fineness analyzer, a laser diffraction system that generates real-time particle size data. Measurements are rapid, generating up to four complete particle size distributions every second. All aspects of measurement are fully- automated. The analyzer software facilitates integration with the Pavilion system and the plant's control platform. Refining the control model to use these parameters was the final step in achieving fully-automated monitoring and control. Vulcan Material's Florida Rock facility has achieved additional benefits from the Malvern lnsitec analyzer working with Pavilion's control application. Together, a 15.3% production increase has been gained, as well as a 20.3% reduction in power consumption, based on full particle size distribution information. These process improvements built upon the increase already achieved with the Pavilion application. Conclusion Government agencies continue to introduce regulations requ1nng tighter control on emissions and waste, paving the way for the implementation of innovative new technology. Initial costs required for plant upgrades are quickly offset with the implementations of sustainable processes. Today, manufacturers are able to painlessly merge lean objectives with green objectives, delivering a return on investment while reducing energy costs and increasing production. Courtesy: World Cement, March 2010, Pp63-67. ENERGY EFFICIENCY SERVICES LIMITED TO PROMOTE ENERGY EFFICIENCY PROJECT The Ministry of Power is promoting a company called Energy Efficiency Services Ltd. (EESL) for implementation of energy efficiency in India. This was announced by Union Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde at the Economic Editors' Conference in New Delhi. The Company will promote energy efficiency projects like Bachat Lamp Yojana, Agricultural Demand Side Management and Municipal Demand Side Management. It will also act as a Resource Centre for capacity building of State Development Agencies, Utilities, financial institutions, etc. The Minister pointed out that the overall size of energy investment market under Energy Service Companies (ESCO) in India is Rs.74,000 crores and till now, only 5% of the market has been tapped. India has huge potential for energy efficiency. An improvement of 20% energy efficiency can result in avoided capacity addition of around 30,000 MW which amounts to an avoided investment of Rs.1,20,000 crores. Shinde informed that the equity of EESL will be Rs. 190 cores with equal contributions from NTPC, PFC, 24