How Chemical Plant Gets Benefits from Asset Management?

Chemical plants are generally old! Once a chemical plant is constructed, it is not touched for decades. The expected life of some of these facilities is ended or about to end to continue their work procedures and operations they need maintenance! Not just these chemical plants but other types of facilities too need maintenance regularly.

Chemical plants are also equipped with lots of machines and assets. They also need to be maintained and from here work of asset management starts. Plant asset management can be very helpful! But first, let us cover some basics.

What Is Plant Asset Management?

Plant asset management gives data about the condition of the asset, just as streamlines activities and improve plant asset capacities. Asset management in the chemical plant helps in limiting unexpected downtime and operational costs, ideal usage of plant resources, and expanded rates of profitability.

Plant asset management takes care of plants including assets. It also enthralled on chemical plant parts for example pipes, pumps, and pressure vessels. Plant asset management solution is used for tracking movement and it creates an environment that is safer for employees. It also enables organization management to make effective business decisions.

Also Read: 7 Aspects You Must Look While Choosing Asset Management Software

According to the Markets and Markets,  “The plant asset management market is expected to grow from USD 5.5 billion in 2019 to USD 9.4 billion by 2024, at a CAGR of 11.3%.”

The market of plant asset management is rising due to the adaptation of this technology by various sectors such as manufacturing, oil & gas, pharmaceutical, metal & mining, solar energy, etc.

What Are the Common Challenges for the Chemical Plant?

The common challenges for chemical plants are as follow:

1. Maintenance of critical assets
2. The unexpected failure of assets
3. Downtime of assets
4. Safety for employees
5. Expensive maintenance bills

How Plants & Facilities Can Take Benefits from Plant Asset Management?

Plant & facilities can take benefits from plant asset management in several ways:

1. Tracking Lifecycle

When an asset is purchased from there the work of Asset management starts! It tracks its operational life when it will need maintenance.

For retrieving data of assets any of the asset tracking techniques can be used such as GPS (Global Positioning System) devices, IoT (Internet of Things) devices, BLE (Bluetooth low energy) devices. One of the main purposes is to tracking asset life and avoid sudden breakdown and one can know when an asset needs to be disposed of!

In this tracking maintenance is also tracked if maintenance is not provided on time then it can result in asset breakdown. As a result, production will be delayed moreover, your organization's reputation will be also damaged.

Also Read: Everything You Need to Know About Maintenance Work Order

2. Proactive Maintenance

Asset management solution functions as a predictive maintenance tool; it empowers experts to decide the working state of field gadgets & assets so they can settle on educated choices about maintaining, keeping up, or replacing those gadgets.

This outcomes in higher dependability of working gear & equipment, and brings down the probability that sudden failure will happen.

Proactive maintenance tackles major challenges that chemical plants are facing. As it decreases the chances of any type of mishappening or asset failure. It also provides data about:

1. Asset condition
2. work order activities completed & left
3. Work order assigned technician
4. Maintenance history

3. Calibration Enhancement

It is a flexible software feature that can be utilized by expert technicians and engineers to align instrumentation, check out control loops, approve interlocks, and aid new businesses.

In simple words, calibration management is done to upgrade the effectiveness of the gear. It resembles overhauling gear to add another or updated feature in equipment and machine.

In this process maintenance and calibration activities are scheduling is done for each asset. For effective calibration, the maintenance team needs to ensure that they have the required part available in the inventory otherwise it will be a not successful operation.

4. Regulatory Compliance

Compliance is a very critical part of a chemical plant. Chemical plants have critical and complex assets and equipment that may contain hazardous particles and that can be harmful to employees. Most of the accidents occur in chemical plants that is why compliance and maintenance are very important factors.

If an asset audit is performed during that audit any violation is found then a huge bill will be generated for violating terms and conditions. Especially for a chemical plant, since it is very complex. Big machines need to be maintained for keeping asset and employee safety.

These chemical plants are also checked if they are keeping the environment safe. Moreover, they need to ensure that no toxic substance is released into the environment. Plant asset management ensures all rules are followed and a solid compliance function can separate your organization from your rivals. With the help of the asset management solution, you can get reports of an asset in practically no time.

Conclusion

Finding and picking the correct asset management tool for your tasks can be precarious. Rather than choosing an item and seller that guarantee to give the 'best' devices, you'll need to distinguish an answer that is an ideal fit for your chemical plant.

Because two organizations belonging to the same industry & the same sector might have different requirements. You need to figure out what exactly are your need then only you will be able to find the right asset management software.

With the right tool, you can perform an audit that will help prepare the external audit. Moreover, issues and problems can be identified and you can solve them. Physical verification of assets can also be done easily. Furthermore, you get detailed asset reports that help identify actual issues, and proper resolution can be taken.

Also Read: 4 Ways to Improve Plant Maintenance at the Time of Low Production

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. Is plant asset management is based on cloud-based technology or not?‍

Yes, plant asset management comes with cloud-based technology.

2. How plant asset management can be improved?‍

As technology is growing day by day for better experience updated asset tracking technology can be used. As it provides more information more customer will feel satisfied.

3. How downtime affects the productivity of any organization?‍

When asset stops working it starts a chain reaction as the work halts and slow the process and loss acceleration increase. For instance, according to a study, an automotive manufacturer (brand in the United States of America) suffers a loss of 22K dollars per minute due to stoppage in production.