Continuous improvement of batch wise operation – a decision support framework

Nowadays, batch wise processing industry operates on a very dynamic market. To a certain extent, batch production plants have the desired flexibility to respond to these dynamics as uncertainties in product demand or new ecological targets. However, because of this flexibility, the complexity of the management and manufacturing operation increases considerably. The management of the operation is so complex, that to guarantee the continuity of the plant on the longer term, well-structured information and clear decision-making focused on continuous improvement are absolute requisites. In this paper, a decision support framework (DSF) will be discussed aimed at giving more insights in the connection between operational activities and objectives of the plant and supporting the continuous search for improvements in operational and managerial tasks in such a way that the continuity of the batch plant can be better guaranteed. The different parts of the framework are illustrated on the basis of a continuous case study in a paper plant. The DSF includes two models, a generic objective model and a generic activity model, that can easily be adapted to the specific situation in which they are used and that are very valuable to obtain a better overview of all relations among operational objectives and activities. Moreover, the management team is supported to select from the large set of operational objectives, the ones that can really contribute to a better overall performance of the plant. This method for selecting promising objectives is based on analytic hierarchy process.