For the commissioning of EME batch plants usually EME engineers travel to site. Due to the current international travel restrictions imposed by Covid-19, it was impossible for EME specialists to travel from Europe to Chile in order to put the plant into operation.
Since Christalchile urgently needed a new batch plant, EME worked out how to commission the plant from Germany via remote control, without the presence of EME specialists on site. For this purpose, Christalchile provided several resources in the field, mechanics and control technology. This team was supported in advance with the necessary process descriptions, manuals, checklists and additional training by EME specialists via video conference.
The remote commissioning of the batch plant was essentially divided into two stages, the cold start-up and the hot commissioning. According to EME specifications, the first stage, the cold start up, was carried out independently by Christalchile using the detailed information provided by EME. During this stage, all drive systems were checked by the customer, frequency converters and soft starters were parametrized.
For the hot commissioning, EME software engineers connected to Christalchile’s system via secure EME VPN to activate the operating and control software. Simultaneously video conferences ran parallel to the commissioning – several time two parallel video conferences on site, from different areas, were carried out by several commissioning engineers at the same time. All the scales were calibrated remotely.
The time difference of 6 hours between Germany and Chile was compensated by flexible working hours at the customer’s site and a 2-shift operation at EME. The complete batch plant was tested and successfully commissioned. Since commissioning, the batch plant has been running continuously without any problems.
Christalchile is now one of many customers to be impressed with EME’s superior remote support services. This success shows that even in difficult times projects can be implemented through new concepts, use of digital conditions and possibilities, commitment, cooperation and willingness.
EME would like to thank and commend the professional Cristalchile team for their outstanding performance and their extensive knowledge of EME’s system, without their support the commissioning would not have be so smooth.