A Process to Implement an Artificial Neural Network and Association Rules Techniques to Improve Asset Performance and Energy Efficiency

In this paper, we address the problem of asset performance monitoring, with the intention of both detecting any potential reliability problem and predicting any loss of energy consumption e ciency. This is an important concern for many industries and utilities with very intensive capitalization in very long-lasting assets. To overcome this problem, in this paper we propose an approach to combine an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) with Data Mining (DM) tools, specifically with Association Rule (AR) Mining. The combination of these two techniques can now be done using software which can handle large volumes of data (big data), but the process still needs to ensure that the required amount of data will be available during the assets’ life cycle and that its quality is acceptable. The combination of these two techniques in the proposed sequence di ers from previous works found in the literature, giving researchers new options to face the problem. Practical implementation of the proposed approach may lead to novel predictive maintenance models (emerging predictive analytics) that may detect with unprecedented precision any asset’s lack of performance and help manage assets’ O&M accordingly. The approach is illustrated using specific examples where asset performance monitoring is rather complex under normal operational conditions.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad DPI2015-70842-

Production Optimization Indexed to the Market Demand Through Neural Networks

Connectivity, mobility and real-time data analytics are the prerequisites for a new model of intelligent production management that facilitates communication between machines, people and processes and uses technology as the main driver. Many works in the literature treat maintenance and production management in separate approaches, but there is a link between these areas, with maintenance and its actions aimed at ensuring the smooth operation of equipment to avoid unnecessary downtime in production. With the advent of technology, companies are rushing to solve their problems by resorting to technologies in order to fit into the most advanced technological concepts, such as industries 4.0 and 5.0, which are based on the principle of process automation. This approach brings together database technologies, making it possible to monitor the operation of equipment and have the opportunity to study patterns of data behavior that can alert us to possible failures. The present thesis intends to forecast the pulp production indexed to the stock market value.The forecast will be made by means of the pulp production variables of the presses and the stock exchange variables supported by artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, aiming to achieve an effective planning. To support the decision of efficient production management, in this thesis algorithms were developed and validated with from five pulp presses, as well as data from other sources, such as steel production and stock exchange, which were relevant to validate the robustness of the model. This thesis demonstrated the importance of data processing methods and that they have great relevance in the model input since they facilitate the process of training and testing the models. The chosen technologies demonstrated good efficiency and versatility in performing the prediction of the values of the variables of the equipment, also demonstrating robustness and optimization in computational processing. The thesis also presents proposals for future developments, namely in further exploration of these technologies, so that there are market variables that can calibrate production through forecasts supported on these same variables.Conectividade, mobilidade e análise de dados em tempo real são pré-requisitos para um novo modelo de gestão inteligente da produção que facilita a comunicação entre máquinas, pessoas e processos, e usa a tecnologia como motor principal. Muitos trabalhos na literatura tratam a manutenção e a gestão da produção em abordagens separadas, mas existe uma correlação entre estas áreas, sendo que a manutenção e as suas políticas têm como premissa garantir o bom funcionamento dos equipamentos de modo a evitar paragens desnecessárias na linha de produção. Com o advento da tecnologia há uma corrida das empresas para solucionar os seus problemas recorrendo às tecnologias, visando a sua inserção nos conceitos tecnológicos, mais avançados, tais como as indústrias 4.0 e 5.0, as quais têm como princípio a automatização dos processos. Esta abordagem junta as tecnologias de sistema de informação, sendo possível fazer o acompanhamento do funcionamento dos equipamentos e ter a possibilidade de realizar o estudo de padrões de comportamento dos dados que nos possam alertar para possíveis falhas. A presente tese pretende prever a produção da pasta de papel indexada às bolsas de valores. A previsão será feita por via das variáveis da produção da pasta de papel das prensas e das variáveis da bolsa de valores suportadas em tecnologias de artificial intelligence (IA), tendo como objectivo conseguir um planeamento eficaz. Para suportar a decisão de uma gestão da produção eficiente, na presente tese foram desenvolvidos algoritmos, validados em dados de cinco prensas de pasta de papel, bem como dados de outras fontes, tais como, de Produção de Aço e de Bolsas de Valores, os quais se mostraram relevantes para a validação da robustez dos modelos. A presente tese demonstrou a importância dos métodos de tratamento de dados e que os mesmos têm uma grande relevância na entrada do modelo, visto que facilita o processo de treino e testes dos modelos. As tecnologias escolhidas demonstraram uma boa eficiência e versatilidade na realização da previsão dos valores das variáveis dos equipamentos, demonstrando ainda robustez e otimização no processamento computacional. A tese apresenta ainda propostas para futuros desenvolvimentos, designadamente na exploração mais aprofundada destas tecnologias, de modo a que haja variáveis de mercado que possam calibrar a produção através de previsões suportadas nestas mesmas variáveis

A review of key planning and scheduling in the rail industry in Europe and UK

Planning and scheduling activities within the rail industry have benefited from developments in computer-based simulation and modelling techniques over the last 25 years. Increasingly, the use of computational intelligence in such tasks is featuring more heavily in research publications. This paper examines a number of common rail-based planning and scheduling activities and how they benefit from five broad technology approaches. Summary tables of papers are provided relating to rail planning and scheduling activities and to the use of expert and decision systems in the rail industry.EPSR

Business analytics in industry 4.0: a systematic review

Recently, the term “Industry 4.0” has emerged to characterize several Information Technology and Communication (ICT) adoptions in production processes (e.g., Internet-of-Things, implementation of digital production support information technologies). Business Analytics is often used within the Industry 4.0, thus incorporating its data intelligence (e.g., statistical analysis, predictive modelling, optimization) expert system component. In this paper, we perform a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) on the usage of Business Analytics within the Industry 4.0 concept, covering a selection of 169 papers obtained from six major scientific publication sources from 2010 to March 2020. The selected papers were first classified in three major types, namely, Practical Application, Reviews and Framework Proposal. Then, we analysed with more detail the practical application studies which were further divided into three main categories of the Gartner analytical maturity model, Descriptive Analytics, Predictive Analytics and Prescriptive Analytics. In particular, we characterized the distinct analytics studies in terms of the industry application and data context used, impact (in terms of their Technology Readiness Level) and selected data modelling method. Our SLR analysis provides a mapping of how data-based Industry 4.0 expert systems are currently used, disclosing also research gaps and future research opportunities.The work of P. Cortez was supported by FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the R&D Units Project Scope: UIDB/00319/2020. We would like to thank to the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions