Coordinated Advanced Maintenance and Logistics planning for the Process Industries

For many complex capital goods, the costs of maintenance and (service) logistics represent a large fraction of the Total Cost of Ownership. Indeed, these costs are often much larger than the procurement cost. Therefore, it is essential to develop maintenance/logistics strategies that minimize cost whilst maximizing the availability and safety of assets. Many process industry companies experiment intensively with condition-based maintenance (CBM), but preventive maintenance is still the norm. In this project, we study the (dis)advantages of CBM and its effects on logistics.

Pooling data

Several characteristics of the process industries make maintenance/logistics planning particularly complex. Most companies operate a small number of (custom-made) complex assets, and obtain limited reliability/process/failure data, making it hard to plan maintenance and preparatory logistics activities. Multiple disciplines and contractors are involved in maintenance operations, and coordination is required to minimize down-time. In line with these characteristics, work packages I and II of this project study the advantages of pooling data and of clustering (condition based) maintenance/logistics operations, respectively, at a control tower. Work package III addresses the possibilities and barriers that exist in practice for implementing such an integrated approach, in particular barriers related to the optimal design of interorganizational maintenance and logistics relations.

Innovative in 5 different ways

This project is innovative in many ways. First, the benefits of data pooling and joint maintenance planning in a centralized control tower approach are ill-researched, especially for advanced condition based strategies. Second, logistical issues concerning the planning of parts, tools and personnel have been disregarded in the literature, despite being crucial for the success of maintenance strategies. Third, the above mentioned characteristics of the process industry concerning service logistics are explicitly taken into account. Fourth, besides developing and testing coordinated planning methods, we also address cultural implementation barriers. Fifth, proof-of-concept and scan tools will be developed in order to put knowledge directly into use, and stimulate partnering companies and the wider industry to pursue further optimization of coordinated maintenance and logistics activities in a control tower approach.

Control Tower approach

The main objective of this project is to further develop a control tower approach for maintenance and logistics planning in the process industries. In the first two work packages we study the benefits of data pooling across disciplines and companies in the service supply chain, and of sharing maintenance/logistics resources and clustering operations. Work package III identifies (cultural) barriers and implementation issues for such a coordinated approach.

For many complex capital goods, the costs of maintenance and (service) logistics represent a large fraction of the Total Cost of Ownership. Indeed, these costs are often much larger than the procurement cost. Therefore, it is essential to develop maintenance/logistics strategies that minimize cost whilst maximizing the availability and safety of assets. Many process industry companies experiment intensively with condition-based maintenance (CBM), but preventive maintenance is still the norm. In this project, we study the (dis)advantages of CBM and its effects on logistics.

For more information please contact Paul Huijbregts, Huijbregts@dinalog.nl