b'MILL OPTIMISATIONThe advantages of mill-wide optimisationBy Peter Cura, on behalf of ValmetFigure 1. Mill Wide Optimisation enables automated decision making and optimising larger entities than beforeconcrete steps towards autonomous millsWith autonomous The development of the IndustrialThere are two main reasons whyby humans, says Samuli Lehtonen,systems Internet in the direction of Artificialcompanies are interested in movingDirector, Operations Performanceyou can Intelligence (AI) and autonomoustowards autonomous mills and mill- Optimisation, Industrial Internet atachieve big mills will enable mill-widewide optimisation. The first is toValmet. improvements optimisation of processes. Goodimprove reliability, and the second isin reliability examples of this, together withto develop operational performance.With autonomous systems you canbecause good results can already be seenIn both areas, digitalisation and theachieve big improvements in reliabilitythey can in the energy industry, which hasIndustrial Internet are key elements. because, instead of being reactive,provide been taking concrete steps towardthey can provide predictive andpredictive this target with centralised remoteWhen we say autonomous, weprescriptive information. They identifyand control rooms and daily heat networkmean machines or mills that can actwhat needs to be done and when,prescriptive optimisation. independently without being controlledso that maintenance is planned andinformation.64 WORLD PULP&PAPER'