Short and long forecast to implement predictive maintenance in a pulp industry

Predictive maintenance is very important for effective prevention of failures in an industry. The present paper describes a case study where a wood chip pump system was analyzed, and a predictive model was proposed. An Ishikawa diagram and FMECA are used to identify possible causes for system failure. The Chip Wood has several sensors installed to monitor the working conditions and system state. The authors propose a variation of exponential smoothing technique for short time forecasting and an artificial neural network for long time forecasting. The algorithms were integrated into a dashboard for online condition monitoring, where the users are alerted when a variable is determined or predicted to get out of the expected range. Experimental results show prediction errors in general less than 10 %. The proposed technique may be of help in monitoring and maintenance of the asset, aiming at greater availability.

An Eco-Friendly Production of a Novel and Highly Active Endo-1,4-beta-xylanase from Aspergillus clavatus

Aims: Here, we describe a novel way to produce an endo-1,4-beta-xylanase from Aspergillus clavatus using paper and pulp industry waste. Methodology: Optimal Aspergillus clavatus NRRL1 cultivation conditions were evaluated using minimal medium with different concentrations (1 to 10%) of paper sludge pretreated with HCl, during different periods (1 to 14 days), with different pH values (3.0; 3.5; 4.0; 4.5; 5.0; 5.5; 6.0; 6.5; 7.0; 7.5 and 8.0), different temperatures (25, 30, 35, and 40 ºC) and different mixing conditions (static and stirring). After that, the enzyme activity was determined by DNS (3,5-dinitrosalicylic acid), protein concentration was quantified by Bradford, SDS-PAGE was performed to evaluate the molecular mass, and TLC observed hydrolysis products. Results: The enzyme showed a molecular mass of 25 kDa, and its production has been highly improved by optimizing culture conditions. The best activity of this enzyme was obtained when A. clavatus was cultivated for 5 days, at 120 rpm, 5% paper sludge, pH 6.0, and 35 ºC. The degradation profile of the beechwood xylan by the crude extract containing the GH11 xylanase showed xylotriose as the main product, but xylotetraose and xylobiose were also produced in significant amounts. Conclusion: In addition to the fact that this xylanase has the property of producing large quantities of XOS (mainly xylotriose), it has the advantage of being obtained from recyclable waste of the pulp and paper industry. These facts confer great potential for future biotechnological and industrial applications.

The effect of protic solvents in the conversion of lignin from Earleaf Acacia tree

Lignin is one of main components of lignocellulosic along with cellulose and hemicellulose. It is a by-product of the paper and pulp industry, and has aromatic backbones making them an ideal renewable feedstock of aromatic compounds for a range of applications. Catalytic conversion of lignin from Earleaf Acacia tree was performed using high pressure/temperature reactor with Ru/C catalyst and protic solvents. The results showed that the conversion of lignin depends on the solvent polarity of protic solvents, and Ru/C catalyst enhanced the lignin conversion. Phenolic compounds are the main components of lignin conversion. Those compounds can be applied as a basement for bulk chemical and fuels.

Hydrothermal Carbonization of Chemical and Biological Pulp Mill Sludges

A modern pulp mill generates a variety of different by-products and waste streams, some of these can be recycled, refined, sold, or used on-site for energy production. However, some, such as chemical and biological sludges produced in wastewater treatment cannot be reused or disposed of easily, mainly due to their high moisture content and poor drying characteristics. Tightening legislation regarding waste disposal as well as the growing need to increase the process efficiencies of pulp mills act as driving forces to find environmentally friendly and energy-efficient techniques for pulp mill sludge treatment. This study summarizes the current methods for pulp mill sludge handling and evaluates the potential of hydrothermal carbonization (HTC), a conversion process through which wet organic substrates can be transformed into a carbonaceous material (hydrochar). Depending on the process parameters, the material’s structure is modified, enabling hydrochar use in energy, soil conditioning and adsorption applications. The sludges were hydrothermally carbonized at 180, 200, 220 and 240 °C for 3 h. The hydrochar and liquid products’ main properties were analyzed. Their potential applications were also evaluated. The effective treatment of sludges from the pulp industry with HTC could transform energy-demanding waste into a value-added source of materials.

Maintenance Prediction through Sensing Using Hidden Markov Models—A Case Study

The availability maximization is a goal for any organization because the equipment downtime implies high non-production costs and, additionally, the abnormal stopping and restarting usually imply loss of product’s quality. In this way, a method for predicting the equipment’s health state is vital to maintain the production flow as well as to plan maintenance intervention strategies. This paper presents a maintenance prediction approach based on sensing data managed by Hidden Markov Models (HMM). To do so, a diagnosis of drying presses in a pulp industry is used as case study, which is done based on data collected every minute for three years and ten months. This paper presents an approach to manage a multivariate analysis, in this case merging the values of sensors, and optimizing the observable states to insert into a HMM model, which permits to identify three hidden states that characterize the equipment’s health state: “Proper Function”, “Alert state”, and “Equipment Failure”. The research described in this paper demonstrates how an equipment health diagnosis can be made using the HMM, through the collection of observations from various sensors, without information of machine failures occurrences. The approach developed demonstrated to be robust, even the complexity of the system, having the potential to be generalized to any other type of equipment.

Membrane Filtration Opportunities for the Treatment of Black Liquor in the Paper and Pulp Industry

Black liquor is a highly alkaline liquid by-product of the kraft pulping process, rich in organic molecules (hemicelluloses, lignin, and organic acids) and inorganic pulping chemicals such as sodium salts and sulphur-containing compounds. The release of this wastewater without further treatment could have serious environmental and financial implications. Therefore, a costly treatment process is used nowadays. Nanofiltration has been studied in the last few years as a promising alternative to recycle the cooking chemicals required for the separation of lignin and cellulose, but the development of pH-stable membranes with the potential to operate at industrial scales is fundamental in order to make this possible. In this study, the filtration performance of two in-house made membranes is evaluated and compared with a commercial NF membrane to determine the viability of their use for the treatment of black liquor. For this purpose, filtration experiments with simulated black liquor were performed. We identified that Membrane A has the higher potential for this application due to its competitive permeate flux (ca. 24 L m−2 h−1 at a trans-membrane pressure of 21.5 bar), and high rejection of organic components and salts from the cooking liquor (on average, 92.50% for the TOC, 84.10% for the CO32−, 88.70% for the sulphates, 73.21% for the Na+, and 99.99% for the Mg2+).

Pulp Enhancement of Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunches (OPEFBs) via Biobleaching by Using Xylano-Pectinolytic Enzymes of Bacillus amyloliquefaciens ADI2

The present work reports the biobleaching effect on OPEFB pulp upon utilisation of extracellular xylano-pectinolytic enzymes simultaneously yielded from Bacillus amyloliquefaciens ADI2. The impacts of different doses, retention times, pH, and temperatures required for the pulp biobleaching process were delineated accordingly. Here, the OPEFB pulp was subjected to pre-treatment with xylano-pectinolytic enzymes generated from the same alkalo-thermotolerant isolate that yielded those of higher quality. Remarkable enhanced outcomes were observed across varying pulp attributes: for example, enzyme-treated pulp treated to chemical bleaching sequence generated improved brightness of 11.25%. This resulted in 11.25% of less chlorine or chemical consumption required for obtaining pulp with optical attributes identical to those generated via typical chemical bleaching processes. Ultimately, the reduced consumption of chlorine would minimise the organochlorine compounds found in an effluent, resulting in a lowered environmental effect of paper-making processes overall as a consequence. This will undoubtedly facilitate such environmentally-friendly technology incorporation in the paper pulp industry of today.

Physical and physiological quality of mangaba seeds obtained by different processing methods

HIGHLIGHTS The seeds obtained from the fruit pulp industry have a physiological quality for seedling propagation. There is a high potential for reducing fruit pulp industry residues by using these seeds for propagation. Higher pixel density is observed for full seeds with an efficiency of forming normal seedlings.