Continuous improvement at leading industrial water treatment JV

The Sino French Water Development Company Limited (“Sino French Water”) is a successful partnership between Suez Environment of France and NWS Holdings Limited of Hongkong. Sino French Water has been active in the Chinese water industry since 1992. Its core businesses can be classified into five areas: water production, water distribution, municipal sewage treatment, industrial water treatment services as well as investment holding company. Sino French Water currently operates 22 joint ventures in 16 Chinese municipalities, serving a population exceeding 14 million inhabitants and employs over 5,000 employees in China.

With an area of 29.4 km2, Shanghai Chemical Industry Park (SCIP) is one of the most heavily invested in industrial projects in China’s 10th Five-Year Plan. In 2002, Sino French Water partnered with SCIP Development Company Limited and SCIP Investment Company Limited to form Shanghai Chemical Industry Park Sino French Water Development Company Limited. With a concession period of 50-year, this joint venture (JV) is exclusively dedicated to providing water and wastewater treatment services to the industrial park.

Water Supply Capacity:	Industrial water: 200,000 m3/day Domestic water: 7,000 m3/day Demineralized water: 150 m3/hour
Wastewater Treatment Capacity:	50,000 m3/day, CODcr load 30 tons/day
Wastewater Treatment Plant:	Each inlet is equipped with online toxicity meters, for real time monitoring of the biological toxicity of the wastewater. Furthermore, the plant has a 15,000 m3 emergency storage capacity for off-spec wastewater. This is used in the event of an accident during production. The storage facility also eliminates pollution load fluctuation from the treatment process. The plant’s treated wastewater meets national emission standards and its discharge point is connected to Shanghai’s Environmental Protection Bureau’s online monitoring system.
Demineralized Water Plant:	The plant has a production capacity of 150 m3/hour. It can reuse treated wastewater as raw water for the production of demineralized water. This results in decreased WWTP discharge volume and better circular economy.
Laboratory:	In 2006, the laboratory started to use a Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS). In 2007, it ranked as a “Reference Laboratory” in Suez Environment’s Inter-laboratory Tests. In 2009, it achieved CNAS accreditation and achieved the ISO 17025 certificate. The laboratory is capable of analyzing around 100 parameters and conducting more than 400 analyses a day.
SCIP Water Research Center (SWRc):	It is China’s first R&D organization dedicated to the research of industrial water and wastewater treatment. In 2008, SWRc acquired one patent. Another creation patent is under consideration in 2009. To promote circular economy, SWRc is working on two projects: one focused on using wetland to treat wastewater; the other on ways to reuse water.
Health and Safety Management:	The JV achieved the Lloyd’s Register Quality Assurance (LQRA) approved ISO 9001 certificate in 2006, as well as the ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 certificates, accredited by the same body, in 2008.

In 2006, SCIP Sino French Water initiated a selection process for a CMMS, to replace earlier purchased software that was never put into actual use. Coswin, with its flexible graphical user interface, compared very favorably with complex IT tools used elsewhere in the group. Moreover Siveco already had a successful reference in Shanghai Chemical Industry Park.

SCIP Sino French Water had from the outset a very clear plan: the implementation of the CMMS would allow the team to grow and improve at their own pace. The company’s management team clearly stated that the project was about learning from their own experience in order to improve, rather than about IT, in line with Siveco’s approach. Consequently, the project was executed in several phases.

The initial focus of the project with Siveco was on building the company’s equipment structure from data already available and to support the work management process. Highly user-friendly diagrams were designed to allow operators to report failures and work requests directly in the system. By involving operation teams in the process and ensuring all corrective work orders were prepared and reported in Coswin, the Sino French Water maintenance team was able to raise its service quality.

After one year of utilization, Sino French Water realized the need to optimize the existing equipments structures and failure codes, in order to better support the decision process and future maintenance improvements. The initial data structure was revamped with the help of Siveco engineers, thus ensuring it could better support future development (plant extension, changes in equipment, improvement in maintenance practice). The management of preventive maintenance was introduced (definition of job guidelines and inspection rounds). New management indicators and reports were designed to support regular meetings and management reporting.

According to Jean-Pierre Arcangeli, General Manager of SCIP Sino French Water Development:

“Coswin has proven to be an excellent tool for our company and Siveco has continuously helped us improve our maintenance management. Four years down the line, good maintenance management habits have been acquired and, as our activity in Shanghai Chemical Industry Park grows, we continue to work with Siveco on the expansion of Coswin.”

After using Coswin successfully for many years, Sino French Water and Siveco have signed of a corporate agreement covering all the company’s operation in China (more than 30 joint ventures). The CMMS solution has subsequently been deployed to many of the group’s joint ventures (full water service, water production, industrial waste water services, sewage water treatment and sludge treatment). Meanwhile, in Q3 2013, SCIP Sino French selected the bluebee^® inspection solution, running on Android mobile phones, to add on to the current Coswin CMMS. This project went live in early 2014.

Tags： improvement、Sino French、water treatment、CMMS、infrastructure、SCIP、Shanghai