In the competitive market of differentiated and specialty chemicals, Huntsman Polyurethanes focused on further digitization of the plants, starting with leveraging time-series data. A self-service analytics platform was selected to help the process, and asset experts contribute to their corporate operational goals. Next to the technology tools, the journey also was, and still is, about organizational and people aspects.
As operational data was kept in separated silos, this added an extra challenge to improve operational excellence by the use of advanced analytics. The lessons learned help new sites quickly adopt the new self-service analytics tool and benchmark site performance independent of the exact location where the original data is stored. The various use cases addressed with the analytics platform provide benefits in many areas. One of the most important is an increase of stable operations, also directly leading to a safer production site.
Within Huntsman, like any other process manufacturing company, operational data has been gathered for years. Typically, the engineers are using their many years of experience in combination with the data for their daily work. So, one might think they work data-driven. But in fact, this is experience-driven, as it is coloring the data with its own experience.
To learn more, read "Chemical plant discovers digital optimization" from Control.