Maintenance partnership celebrates over 10 years of continuous improvement

Norilsk Nickel Harjavalta Oy (NNH), located in Finland, is a member of the Norilsk Nickel Group and develops competitive products and production technology. NNH employs 230 people and produces roughly 60,000 metric tons of nickel chemicals and nickel metals annually.

Quant has been responsible for maintenance operations at Harjavalta Industrial Park since 1999, and the Total Maintenance Outsourcing agreement with Norilsk Nickel Harjavalta Oy was recently renewed again for another 3-year term starting in 2015.

Tommi Heikkilä, maintenance manager at Norilsk Nickel Harjavalta, explains why NNH wanted to continue the Total Maintenance Outsourcing agreement: “We wanted to make sure the development of maintenance continues as it had before, and we saw that Quant has the capability to continue this development. We have had, and will have, many process changes that Quant have adapted, and will adapt to, together with our joint strategy. This requires the maintenance functions to be very flexible and the communication in this partnership plays a key role. Our common target is to optimize OEE and secure the most efficient utilization of our assets,” says Tommi Heikkilä.

The current maintenance plan also pays special attention to predictability and the improvement of maintenance disciplines. According to NNH’s Senior Manager, Plant Services Kimmo Tuomi, unnecessary production breaks are avoided by executing a service program every four weeks. This includes continuous onsite condition monitoring.

Increased emphasis on OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) has also improved technical availability, which has risen from 96.7% to 99.6% between 2003 and 2010. This represents a decrease of 86% in production losses.

Benefits

• Maintenance has managed to improve effectiveness even when the production process has changed significantly
• Lost production volume due to maintenance downtime has decreased by 86% between 2003 and 2010
• Technical availability of production reached 99% in 2008 (96.7% in 2003) with availability levels at steady 99.4% – 99.6% (2008-2010)