Here's how you can enhance your skills and stay competitive in Plant Operations using technology.

The resources that technology provides us today are essential to keep our competitiveness, but before investing in technology or automation, be sure that the cell that you will investe has all the productivity improvements implemented from Lean so that a "bad or stupid cell" is not automated. Hire a specialized company, research automation processes, try to visit a company and do a benchmark before investing.

A automa??o industrial utiliza tecnologias para otimizar e controlar processos produtivos, aumentando a eficiência, reduzindo erros e custos, além de melhorar a seguran?a. O PLC é uma pe?a fundamental nesse contexto, pois permite o controle preciso de máquinas e processos através de lógicas programáveis, adaptando-se a diversas aplica??es industriais. Para o profissional da área, o conhecimento sobre automa??o e o uso de PLCs é crucial. Ele precisa entender tanto a programa??o quanto o funcionamento dos sistemas automatizados, o que o capacita a instalar, programar, diagnosticar e solucionar problemas. Esse domínio também é essencial para acompanhar inova??es tecnológicas e garantir o funcionamento eficiente dos sistemas industriais.

Basic automation has many facets and there is often many areas that can result in huge productivity gains for little cost. Focusing on areas such as Loop tuning, and Alarm management on top of ensuring good process design. High performance HMIs also help but require a significant input from operations staff. Skills in these areas can easily be learned but regular application is a must to deliver the most value.

Automation has become one of the most important topics in engineering, as it has been the subject of a constant search to generate efficient processes, with the minimum margin of error and making the most of all the resources available to engineers.

The major problem we can face here is the Accurate Data Collection. Unless we have all IoT enabled machineries, we have to rely on human intervention for reports and collection. Where there's no IoT, we need to establish first a proper work flow for data collection and streamline the process. In plant operations accuracy of data should be our prime focus. The analytical part can be smoother.

Data analysis is important, however, it is important to know what type of information is really valuable and what is redundant, that is, being able to count on a data analyst is as important as having an efficient and standardized way of collecting the information, because let us remember that many people in the engineering field may have different concepts or names for the same type of element and if the way of describing/naming a failure is not standardized, it cannot be measured adequately and therefore the data analysis could become unreliable.

Nowadays, many companies still don't give enough importance to Predictive Maintenance, however this is one of the most powerful tools that a company should be able to count on, because thanks to it, machine failures are prevented from reaching their critical point, saving costs and reducing the amount of downtime that a large-scale failure can generate.

Preventive maintenance is very important for machines and equipment and maintenance team make preventive maintenance on machines and equipment day by day according to the schedule which determines the date for each equipment to make all equipment and machines more reliable and efficient and reduce the failure to make our plants more reliable and help us to make continuity in production.

In plant operations, optimizing energy consumption through advanced technologies like Energy Management Systems (EMS) and conducting regular energy audits leads to significant savings and enhances system reliability. Energy-efficient practices help extend equipment life, reduce waste, and improve overall operational performance, positioning businesses for long-term success in a competitive market.

O campo de opera??es da planta está em constante evolu??o e o aprendizado contínuo é vital para se manter competitivo. Ao se comprometer com a aprendizagem ao longo da vida, você garantirá que suas habilidades permane?am relevantes e que esteja sempre pronto para o próximo avan?o tecnológico