MATERIAL PROFILE STACKING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

THE SOLUTION

Real-time planning, scheduling, tracking and management of the day-to-day stacking process of materials at a steel plant stockyard via an automated material stacking control system.

A solution which has only been successfully replicated at a handful of sites globally by other speclialised 3rd party providers, involved the real-time planning, scheduling, tracking and management of the day-to-day stacking process of materials at a steel plant stockyard. The client previously calculated their stockpile volumes using the Chevron stacking method and the DEVUM platform was used to create an equivelant mathematical model to perform these calculations accurately and in real-time. This model proved useful for a blending or homogenizing operation at the stockpile, as well as for automation of a stockpiling process. The solution was visualized in 3D with data analytics overlay. The solution accurately defined operational parameters and enabled improved equipment utilisation and enhanced overall operations management.

CLIENT

A multinational steel production company with a global footprint in over 140 countries. The group is the second largest steel companies in India producing an annual steel production output in excess of 18 MTPA. The plant in question is the first integrated steel plant to reach 12MTPA capacity in a single location in India and is also the first in India to use Corex technology for hot metal production.

THE PROBLEM STATEMENT

Chemistry variation in input Raw material feed

The twin-boom stacker stacks the dissimilar material layer-wise in the stockyard for pelletization to plant. According to the Chemical variation ratio provided by experts, this not being executed successfully resulted in a significant negative impact. Post-analysis of operation indicates that material contributions from different source locations are not distributed to twin boom stackers as planned.

DEVUM’s Fluent Services and 3D composer were used to build and visualize the required algorithm to ensure that valid material is distributed correctly to the stacker.

Variation in layer formation

The Twin boom Stacker’s luffing operation, speed of stacker, and speed of the conveyor plays a major role in the required layer formation. If the angle of the boom, speed of the machine, and speed of the conveyor is not managed properly, sagging of the heap formation occurs. Due to uneven layer formation, the predefined chemistry value set by experts cannot be achieved. The resultant variation in layer formation impacts much on the quality of discharged output.

DEVUM’s Fluent Services and KPI builder was used to create a mathematical model which assisted in the optimisation of the stacking profile.

Twin boom stacker controlling

The primary controls of the twin-boom stacker are machine speed, angle of boom and speed of conveyor. As Luffing operation and machine movement are relying on the speed of the conveyor, Improper layer formation would take place due to a lack of suitable twin boom stacker operation. Followed by improper layer formation, maintaining chemistry composition is tough to maintain.

DEVUM’s integration-friendly platform facilitated integration with IoT sensors the hardware PLC systems to achieve intelligent automated control of the stacker and stacking process.

INFOGRAPHIC

SCREENSHOTS

BUSINESS VALUE