Cement industry plays a pivotal role in the infrastructure development. With the
government giving a boost to large scale infrastructure development, the cement
industry in India is set for a big growth. To meet the rise in demand, cement companies
are focusing on adoption of massive modernisation and assimilation of state-of-art
technology to become energy-efficient and comparable to the best in the word in
all respects, whether it is klin size, technology, energy consumption or environment-friendliness.
Faced with the challenge of efficient use of energy, major players of the cement
industry are adopting best manufacturing practices to optimize energy, natural resource
consumption and technology. Energy saving varies on a case-to-case basis depending
on the actual selection of process and equipment, quality and consistency of fuel,
raw material characteristics, etc.
Waste Heat Recovery System
The cement industry is currently focusing on five broad categories: thermal and
electrical energy efficiency, co-processing of alternate fuels and raw material,
clinker substitution, waste heat recovery for power generation and adoption of new
technologies like use of bio-fuels. In this context, the upcoming plants are considering
alternative fuel and raw materials (AFR) and waste heat recovery (WHR) system for
power generation. It is imperative to make WHR a mandatory requirement for any new
cement plant, as is the case in some emerging countries. A significant portion of
the energy requirement can be sourced through utilisation of waste heat from the
pre-heater and cooler. Typically, cement plants do not have significant low-temperature
heating requirements, so most waste heat recovery projects have been successful.
The amount of waste heat available for recovery depends on kiln system design and
production, the moisture content of the raw materials, and the amount of heat required
for drying in the raw mill system, solid fuel system and cement mill. Waste heat
recovery can provide up to 30% of a cement plant's overall electricity needs and
offers the following advantages:
- Reduces purchased power consumption (or reduces reliance on captive power plants),
which in turn reduces operating costs
- Mitigates the impact of future electricity price increases
- Enhances plant power reliability
- Improves plant competitive position in the market
- Lowers plant specific energy consumption, reducing greenhouse gas emissions (based
on credit for reduced central station power generation or reduced fossil-fired captive
power generation at the cement plant)
A WHR installation is a relatively complex system with multiple inter-related subsystems.
The basic package for a steam-based system consists of heat recovery boilers or
heat exchangers, steam turbine, gearbox, electric generator, condenser, steam and
condensate piping, lubrication and cooling systems, water-treatment system, electrical
interconnection equipment and controls. Total installed cost, which includes design,
engineering, construction and commissioning can significantly vary depending on
the scope of plant equipment.
Industry is looking forward to electrical and automation solutions that will help
in better power management and waste heat recovery. Automation helps in understanding
how much energy each unit is using, thereby revealing the 'energy wasters' that
can be replaced by more efficient systems. Automation also monitors energy imports,
and helps to stay within contractual limits, for example, through selectively switching
off non-critical defined parts of the plant.
Cyber Security
Aside from desire to become energy-efficient, some companies are investing in advanced
technologies to boost manufacturing flexibility and speed, supply chain responsiveness,
and customer satisfaction.
For years, traditional factories have been operating in isolation and disconnected
with corporate business systems, where managers have only poor visibility
into downtime and quality problems , and where the root causes of inefficiencies
are hardly understood or addressed.
To get ahead, modern manufacturers are adopting new plant architectures where in
plant network converges with global IT networks. In such a scenario, it is absolutely
critical to protect your Control Network infrastructure, as today, global cyber
attacks are not just restricted to the IT world. More and more process/manufacturing
industries are falling prey to various attacks that are designed to cripple the
entire organization. Lack of awareness and inability to update the process control
systems on regular basis are the major loop-holes which act in the favour of the
attackers. Apart from financial losses, there can be significant impact to the environment
and human lives; such attacks could also affect the very existence of the organization
in the long run.
Some of the primary causes of lost production leading to financial loss and impact
to environment are incorrectly configured firewalls, viruses and un-installed or
outdated system patches. To effectively address security, people, processes and
technology must be considered. Advance requirements like remote monitoring and diagnosis
on real time basis of critical equipments by the OEM, which may happen on the internet,
calls for implementation of secure and robust infrastructure for integrating the
PCN environment with the Enterprise network.
There is a significant difference between the security philosophies of enterprise
IT and Process Control Network (PCN). The purpose of enterprise security is to protect
the data residing in the servers from attack. The purpose of PCN security is to
protect the ability of the facility to safely and securely operate the automation
activities which may consist of systems like DCS, SCADA, HMIs and equipment like
PLC, RTU and sensors, regardless of what may befall the rest of the network. The
use of mainstream operating system environments such as Windows, UNIX, Linux and
various open sources systems as well as COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) networking
components for running PCN applications leave them just as vulnerable as IT systems.
However, the application of mainstream IT security technical solutions may not work
as effectively for automation systems primarily because of their deterministic operation;
they are not designed for 'patching' since their mission critical applications do
not permit a 'reboot' for these upgrades to take effect.
The biggest challenge in making plant automation, protection and control systems
more secure thus relate to human behaviour and organizational processes.
The first step in any security programme should be the development of a security
policy - a document identifying the overall security goals and objectives and defining
what the valuable assets are that need to be protected. The security policy is the
basis for any technical, procedural, or organizational security mechanism, yet clearly
defined security policies do not exist for many control systems today. Creating,
communicating, and enforcing a security policy are management's responsibility and
should no longer be neglected. After developing a security policy, the next step
is to build in processes to help establish and enforce it. These processes, for
example, would include employee hiring and leaving, but should also describe incident
handling and disaster recovery.
Additionally, the security policy should offer a well-documented plan about how
to deal with possible security incidents or breaches and address questions such
as what should be done, who must be involved, and how to restore the system. Just
as important as having these processes documented is exercising them regularly to
ensure they work.
Overall, the demand for cyber security, both from technical as well as from process
perspectives, will increase in the near future. Cyber security will become mandatory
requirements in products, systems, solutions, and processes as industry standards
are developed and regulations are adopted as law.