Digitalising traditional industrial processes – a collaboration between Valsemøllen and AVEVA Select shows the way

The classic industrial company Valsemøllen is one of Denmark’s largest producers of bakery products. Since it all started in 1899, a lot has happened and now Valsemøllen is tackling the industrial revolution of digitalisation and automation. What does it take to succeed?

Carsten Mariager is Production Manager at Valsemøllen. Production is spread over three different plants, takes place in mills and silos and handles 150,000 tonnes of grain per year. At the Esbjerg plant, the silos were old and needed to be replaced. The purification facility also needed to be renewed and IT equipment replaced – a requirement that opened other doors. It was a perfect opportunity to implement a new control system, says Carsten Mariager.

– We needed a new control system. The one we had was too manual and inefficient and didn’t offer much traceability, which we wanted. We have many production phases and a high level of production, so controlling it all is a complicated process, he says.

Control systems make processes more efficient

Whatever type of renewal an industry undertakes, it is important to understand the needs and challenges of the business. Without this, it will be difficult to choose the right path. For Valsemøllen, for example, it was about finding a solution that would automate manual processes, enable traceability, provide a better overview of production, and would not involve long or extensive production stops. The solution they found was AVEVA MES (Manufacturing Execution System).

– The AVEVA control system covers our 39 storage silos. These contain a variety of types and qualities of grain. In the past, we measured the raw materials manually to get the right recipe developed by the laboratories; it was measured with a ruler. Then everything was entered into Excel files, which meant a lot of paperwork. Today, the silos are equipped with flow balancers, and I have a digital system where I can see everything. I can also go back and see what has happened in the past month, Carsten Mariager reports.

– As Carsten mentions, the recipes are controlled by the laboratory. The quality of the raw material picked up from the surface can vary and therefore the laboratory adapts recipes based on different environmental parameters. Now they come digitally and automatically in the control system, says Claus Sass Hvass, Customer Success Manager at AVEVA Select Scandinavia.

Digitalisation – the key to seamless production

Automating and digitalising huge industrial processes is not without its challenges. When a new system is to be implemented, there are many things that have to be right and synchronised for everything to go smoothly.

– We had two major challenges in the transition. One was that we started from scratch and had to build up the control via P&I (Piping and Instrumentation) diagrams and functional descriptions. The other big challenge was that we had a maximum of three days to make the move before it had to work seamlessly, Carsten Mariager says.

Although the relocation itself was to take place quickly, AVEVA Select and Valsemøllen’s preparations were thorough and took a long time.

– For a digitalisation project like this, you need to think long-term. You need to think outside the box and imagine what you need today and in ten years’ time. What we get now via our MES system is large amounts of data, but then we need to know what data we want and need today and in the future. It is also extremely important to prepare well. We have involved many people in the organisation to get this right, Carsten Mariager says.

– We have carried out the implementation in close co-operation with our endorsed system integrator Eltronic, who has been working on a quality assurance system. They have started by doing a lot of interviews with different people within Valsemøllen, who had to tell us about their wishes and goals with this. This is not something you do overnight. We spent about a year on these preparations, so it’s important to have the right expectations from the start, says Claus Sass Hvass.

Today, Valsemøllen has a completely paperless production process. The plant’s millers can focus on technical tasks instead of manual reporting in Excel. They also have a better overview of production, fewer mistakes in order management and last but not least – traceability.

Want to better understand what it takes to transform and streamline traditional industrial processes? Make sure to visit AVEVA Select Scandinavia during Scanautomatic 8-10 October 2024 where they are exhibiting at Ny Teknik AI Arena.

Secure your free admission ticket here