Lean Manufacturing In Chemical Industry

Lean manufacturing and continuous improvement can be applied to factory processes including chemical and wastewater management, compressed air, boilers and thermal oxidizers. Batch units do lend themselves to lean manufacturing concepts, not only during the change over, but also in each step of the batch. In continuous process manufacturing, the “entity” is already flowing in the form of liquid or slurry and would not become “pieces” until dried and unitized.

Process manufacturing is fundamentally different from discrete manufacturing in the way material flows. Material flows in a continuous stream in process manufacturing, while parts move in batches in discrete manufacturing.

In the commodity chemicals business, both size and integration play a key role in keeping the costs of the company minimum.

Lean manufacturing is applicable in:

• Petrochemicals
• Chemicals
• Distilleries

BENEFITS OF LEAN MANUFACTURING IN CHEMICAL INDUSTRY

• 5S/SMED workshops help to reduce the time operators need to load/unload reactors and help to decrease waiting time by making workplace more efficient
• 5S in laboratory/ R& D cell reduced the analysis time
• Value stream mapping and process analysis helps to improve and reduce batch times
• TPM and spares management for high OEE and MTBF and reduced
• Total Quality Management
• Just In Time (JIT)