The case study discusses how AdityaPower provided an efficient but cost-effective indigenous solution to a lime kiln.
AdithyaPower was incorporated on September 26, 2016 with its registered office at Nagpur, Maharashtra. The company serves in the following key areas of refractories:
- Technical audit of ongoing projects to avoid installation mistakes and improve refractory performance
- Technical audit of existing processes to recommend shutdown planning and material estimation for the shutdown
- Third party inspection of the refractory material and accessories like anchors, insulation board, paper, wool, etc.
- Review of design engineering before giving approval by customer for manufacturing
- Recommendation and assist in implementation of system for optimising the performance of refractories
- Supervision during installation
- Design engineering specially for revamp or new projects
- Material selection depending upon process parameters
- Supply and installation – total turnkey project management
- Review of systems/manuals including dry out and commissioning
- Troubleshooting
The problem as informed by customer were:
- Kiln was operational for want of arched imported basic bricks from Germany.
- The bricks will not be available for the next four to six months, so lime kiln will remain idle.
- Customer was sourcing lime from outside supplier, which was costing money and erratic delivery schedule.
Since these types of kilns are many in India and globally, the challenge for AdithyaPower (APPL) was to provide an efficient but cost-effective indigenous solution. Customer did approach a multinational refractory company having operations in India for a solution but they raised their hand saying – not possible and that intensified the challenge further.
The steps APPL followed:
- Inspected the furnace thoroughly from inside
- Identified the reason of arch failure
- Studied closely equivalent material available in India for this application,
- Designed 3D model to understand the correctness of solution offered by APPL
- Approached customer with proposed solution.
The customer was convinced with our proposal and took decision to go ahead with APPL solution. AdithyaPower consulted with the best in the industry with the possible options and finally went ahead with implementation.
Materials were supplied within three weeks and manpower was mobilised immediately thereafter. The jobs?including dismantling of the old refractory-was completed in 20 days, within committed schedule to the customer.
The outcome:
- Customer started producing lime required for their in-house consumption and stopped buying the same from outside agencies.
- The lime kiln, which was repaired with in-house engineering and materials, started producing 50 MT per additional lime than their standard normal output.
Customer saved huge amount of money and also indigenisation resulted in saving precious foreign exchange for the country.
Customer awarded second kiln in order with further modification to handle deficiencies encountered by the operation team.
The lime kiln has been restored with complete indigenous solution and both the kilns are functioning well.
AdithyaPower is headed by Devendra Singh, Managing Director, having refractory project handling experience of more than 36 years out of which 27 years have been with Calderys as Global Project and Technical Head for aluminum, boiler and incinerator. Singh was personally involved with more than 300 aluminium, power and incinerator projects globally. The team is exposed globally due to long association with multinational companies including Calderys and has acquired skills at par with developed world but at a much reasonable cost to its esteemed customers.
The strategy for sustainable development adopted by APPL are:
- Offer total solution
- The cost of project to be kept lowest by smart outsourcing Refractory material as per specification of APPL
- Enter into long term contract with manpower and equipment supplier for projects
Devendra Kumar Singh is Managing Director of AdithyaPower.