How Alcoa Canned the Cost of Recycling

Alcoa is one of the world?s largest aluminium smelting and casting multinationals, and involves itself in everything from tin cans, to jet engines to single-forged hulls for combat vehicles. Energy costs represent 26% of the company?s total refining costs, while electricity contributes 27% of primary production outlays. Its Barberton Ohio plant shaved 30% off both energy use and energy cost, after a capital outlay of just $21 million, which for it, is a drop in the bucket.

Aluminium smelting is so expensive that some critics describe the product as ?solid electricity?. In simple terms, the method used is electrolysis whereby current passes through the raw material in order to decompose it into its component chemicals. The cryolite electrolyte heats up to 1,000 degrees C (1,832 degrees F) and converts the aluminium ions into molten metal. This sinks to the bottom of the vat and is collected through a drain. Then they cast it into crude billets plugs, which when cooled can be re-smelted and turned into useful products.

The Alcoa Barberton factory manufactures cast aluminium wheels across approximately 50,000 square feet (4,645 square meters) of plant. It had been sending its scrap to a sister company 800 miles away; who processed it into aluminium billets – before sending them back for Barberton to turn into even more wheels. By building its own recycling plant 60 miles away that was 30% more efficient, the plant halved its energy costs: 50% of this was through process engineering, while the balance came from transportation.

The transport saving followed naturally. The recycling savings came from a state-of-the-art plant that slashed energy costs and reduced greenhouse gas emissions. Interestingly enough, processing recycled aluminium uses just 5% of energy needed to process virgin bauxite ore. Finally, aluminium wheels are 45% lighter than steel, resulting in an energy saving for Alcoa Barberton?s customers too.

The changes helped raise employee awareness of the need to innovate in smaller things too, like scheduling production to increase energy efficiency and making sure to gather every ounce of scrap. The strategic change created 30 new positions and helped secure 350 existing jobs.

The direction that Barberton took in terms of scrap metal recycling was as simple as it was effective. The decision process was equally straightforward. First, measure your energy consumption at each part of the process, then define the alternatives, forecast the benefits, confirm and implement. Of course, you also need to be able to visualise what becomes possible when you break with tradition.

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What are the benefits of digital forms data collection
Field Service Workers are regularly engaged to collect data or carry out inspections and assessments when visiting customer sites or remote area locations. The data collected by Field Service workers, will be used by businesses who will analyse, process and build reports based on the large volumes of data collected. The accuracy and reliability of data collected is vitally important. Traditionally businesses may have deployed mail surveys, telephone interviews, door-to-door surveys and interviews performed by Field Workers to collect data. Digital Transformation is gradually changing many business operations and a great deal of processes which were traditionally executed manually are now accomplished making use of digital methods. Technology is having a major impact not only how businesses research and analyse data, but primarily how data and information is collected. New tools and processes to data collection are improving data collection and analysis, leading to dramatic improvements and maximisation and optimisation of resources and operations. Utilising Digital Data Collection methods enables organisations to not only obtain results quicker but also use the data to make data based decisions faster.

What is a Digital Form?

Digital Forms, also known as Mobile Forms are electronic versions of paper forms that can be completed using:
  • Laptop
  • Tablet
  • Smart Phone
  • Any Mobile Device

Why Use Digital Forms ?

Digital forms can be a simple yet highly effective solution to overcome the challenges presented by paper based forms. Digital forms can be filled out directly using Smart phones and tablets in the field
  • When not connected to the internet or even low speed internet connections
  • When working in remote locations
  • To avoid damage, illegible handwriting or even lost and misplaced forms.
Digital forms can also include data validation logic to ensure field workers complete every form as expected and required, which will enforce and ensure data integrity . Field Service teams appreciate these features and help ensure the validity and accuracy of the data and insights they collect and can be confident regarding making business critical data based decisions. Data and Information collected using mobile forms can be accessible in near real-time, helps enable field teams to sidestep potential obstacles to productivity, and act on opportunities and increasing business agility.

Advantages of Digital Forms

Time and Cost Saving

Using Digital Forms instead of paper-based forms provides a significant impact on improving time and cost savings on printing, storing and distribution costs. Businesses also spend a significant amount of time and money in Administration and double data entry processes incurred by paper based forms. Transferring information from paper based surveys is an error prone process.
Digital Forms can save up to 20 man hours a week in administration costs

Improve data accuracy

Digital Forms can auto-populate fields based on prior data entered and also enable field-level validation. Digital data collection also eliminated data entry errors and data loss. Additional data can also be automatically be gathered such as Username, Geo-location and Time & Date.

Real Time Reporting

The issue with Paper-based data collection is that there will always be a time lag before reports or decision can be made. With a digital platform, such as FieldElite – Mobile Workforce Management , data can be processed and analysed as it is collected. Providing data driven insights to provide proactive rather than reactive reports to improve and optimise operations in real time.

It’s time to go Digital Forms!

Data Collection using Digital Forms will propel your company into the future and transform your data collection, data entry and analysis providing accurate data driven insights in real time. Digital forms are also mobile-optimized, updated in real time, and accessible by multiple parties, eliminating unnecessary meetings and emails. If you have a business and still haven’t used digital forms to gather information, contact Denizon today to organise a Demo of FieldElite – Mobile Workforce Management and discover how we can help you to transform your Field Service Operations

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The Connection Between Six Sigma and CRM

Six Sigma is an industrial business strategy directed at improving the quality of process outputs by eliminating errors and system variables. The end objective is to achieve a state where 99.99966% of events are likely to be defect free. This would yield a statistical rating of Sigma 6 hence the name.

The process itself is thankfully more user-friendly. It presents a model for evaluating and improving customer relationships based on data provided by an automated customer relations management (CRM) system. However in the nature of human interaction we doubt the 99.99966% is practically achievable.

Six Sigma Fundamentals

The basic tenets of the business doctrine and the features that set off are generally accepted to be the following:

  1. Continuous improvement is essential for success
  1. Business processes can be measured and improved
  1. Top down commitment is fundamental to sustained improvement
  1. Claims of progress must be quantifiable and yield financial benefits
  1. Management must lead with enthusiasm and passion
  1. Verifiable data is a non-negotiable (no guessing)

Steps Towards the Goal

The five basic steps in Six Sigma are define the system, measure key aspects, analyse the relevant data, improve the method, and control the process to sustain improvements. There are a number of variations to this DMAIC model, however it serves the purpose of this article. To create a bridge across to customer relationships management let us assume our CRM data has thrown out a report that average service times in our fast food chicken outlets are as follows.

<2 Minutes 3 to 8 Minutes 9 to 10 Minutes >10 Minutes
45% 30% 20% 5%
Table: Servicing Tickets in Chippy?s Chicken Caf?s

Using DMAIC to unravel the reasons behind this might proceed as follows

  • Define the system in order to understand the process. How are customers prioritised up front, and does the back of store follow suit?
  • Break the system up into manageable process chunks. How long should each take on average? Where are bottlenecks most likely to occur?
  • Analyse the ticket servicing data by store, by time of day, by time of week and by season. Does the type of food ordered have a bearing?
  • Examine all these variables carefully. Should there for example be separate queues for fast and slower orders, are there some recipes needing rejigging
  • Set a goal of 90% of tickets serviced within 8 minutes. Monitor progress carefully. Relate this to individual store profitability. Provide recognition.

Conclusion

A symbiotic relation between CRM and a process improvement system can provide a powerful vehicle for evidencing customer care and providing feedback through measurable results. Denizon has contributed to many strategically important systems.?

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Monitoring Water Banks with Telemetrics

Longstanding droughts across South Australia are forcing farmers to rethink the moisture in the soil they once regarded as their inalienable right. Trend monitoring is an essential input to applying pesticides and fertilisers in balanced ratios. Soil moisture sensors are transmitting data to central points for onward processing on a cloud, and this is making a positive difference to agricultural output.

Peter Buss, co-founder of Sentek Technology calls ground moisture a water bank and manufactures ground sensors to interrogate it. His hometown of Adelaide is in one of the driest states in Australia. This makes monitoring soil water even more critical, if agriculture is to continue. Sentek has been helping farmers deliver optimum amounts of water since 1992.

The analogy of a water bank is interesting. Agriculturists must ?bank? water for less-than-rainy days instead of squeezing the last drop. They need a stream of online data and a safe place somewhere in the cloud to curate it. Sentek is in the lead in places as remote as Peru?s Atacamba desert and the mountains of Mongolia, where it supports sustainable floriculture, forestry, horticulture, pastures, row crops and viticulture through precise delivery of scarce water.

This relies on precision measurement using a variety of drill and drop probes with sensors fixed at 4? / 10cm increments along multiples of 12? / 30cm up to 4 times. These probe soil moisture, soil temperature and soil salinity, and are readily re-positioned to other locations as crops rotate.

Peter Buss is convinced that measurement is a means to the end and only the beginning. ?Too often, growers start watering when plants don’t really need it, wasting water, energy, and labour. By monitoring that need accurately, that water can be saved until later when the plant really needs it.? He goes on to add that the crop is the ultimate sensor, and that ?we should ask the plant what it needs?.

This takes the debate a stage further. Water wise farmers should plant water-wise crops, not try to close the stable door after the horse has bolted and dry years return. The South Australia government thinks the answer also lies in correct farm dam management. It wants farmers to build ones that allow sufficient water to bypass in order to sustain the natural environment too.

There is more to water management than squeezing the last drop. Soil moisture goes beyond measuring for profit. It is about farming sustainably using data from sensors to guide us. ecoVaro is ahead of the curve as we explore imaginative ways to exploit the data these provide for the common good of all.

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