Challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic didn’t halt CISDI

The COVID-19 pandemic posed great challenges for CISDI’s project teams.

But all projects for the Chinese markets are now pushing forward and schedules and contractual obligations are now back on track, thanks to careful organisation and the tremendous solidarity shown by all involved.

 

XUSTEEL’s meltshop

CISDI is providing EPC-based services for the XUSTEEL meltshop for its steelmaking and continuous casting plants.

After the full resumption of work in mid March, it took only 41 days to complete the construction of a central control building - 10 days ahead of the contractual schedule.

The structure is 92.1 metres long and 18.3 metres high, with a total floor area of 2,849.81 square metres.

The main civil work has been completed, including foundations for the BOF, a 9.5m-high operation platform, the external body of the cyclone pool, the underground bin’s submerged sections and foundations for the dust collector.

Design, procurement and construction are being controlled holistically by CISDI. The steel structures are now going full steam ahead and all the design should be completed by the June deadline.

 

The roof of XUSTEEL meltshop’s central control building nears completion

 

Zhanjiang Steel’s centralised water control centre

CISDI Information Technology Co. is the force behind the creation of Zhanjiang Steel’s intelligent, centralised water control centre.

The primary project for Zhanjiang Intelligent Energy, Step 2 has now been built.

CISDI’s team made sterling efforts during the pandemic. During lockdown, work continued on drawings, software design, procurement, equipment delivery, construction and coordination with supporting companies.

The company’s instrumentation engineers braved the pandemic to head to Zhanjiang’s site to carry out surveying, commissioning and drawing. Working to a very tight schedule, they completed 10 sets of construction drawings.

CISDI’s computer engineers had to work around the clock when a software interface supplier could not be available because of the pandemic.

This threatened the March 30 deadline for getting the control centre online.

The engineering team studied the third-party’s data service code and built a testing environment, enabling interface connections to be commissioned successfully.

CISDI got the water systems of three plants - hot strip mill, blast furnace 1 and steelmaking - online four days before deadline.

Their control systems were locally modified and passed tests for integration into the intelligent centre.

Such successes boosted morale across all teams working on Zhanjiang Steel’s frontline projects.

The CISDI-developed intelligent and centralised water centre has now completed its water balance analysis and forecast and is intelligently-assisting production, and is providing an intelligent, coordinated platform for spot and patrol checking and an intelligent reporting system.

The full-process, optimised coordination and dispatch model is being developed.

CISDI’s IT team will be bringing digital to Zhanjiang Steel’s production technology and management and further enhance its water efficiency, working conditions and economic benefits.

 

CISDI’s intelligent, centralised water control team working at Zhanjiang Steel

 

Zhanjiang Steel’s autonomous locomotive

The intelligent, autonomous locomotive transportation of hot metal will be the benchmark for Zhanjiang Steel’s Intelligent Logistics.

Now at the critical stage of commissioning, the project could easily have been derailed by the pandemic.

With only a limited workforce available, CISDI’s team kept it on track by formulating a multi-shift system operating around the clock.

It is continuously commissioning to improve the locomotive system functions.

The autonomous locomotive technology is a world first - there are no previous experiences or data to reference, which makes for many challenges along the way.

Artificial intelligence plays an indispensable role in ensuring a highly-efficient and stable operation. The application of an environmental perception system based on machine vision, plus an intelligent dispatch system based on deep learning and algorithm, needs the support of a massive amount of data.

All data acquisitions and operation process collections have been personally carried out by CISDI Information Technology Co. The required data was captured via numerous tests and inspections.

  

 

A CISDI engineer commissions the autonomous locomotive at Zhanjiang Steel

 

Rizhao Steel’s ESP5

Rizhao Steel’s ESP5 was one of the first projects CISDI’s teams got back on schedule during the pandemic.

As the EPC-based contractor, in mid February CISDI swiftly pulled together over 600 workers and organised construction work to run 24 hours a day.

The team united as one to ensure every construction milestone was reached on schedule.

Equipment foundations for the Roughing Mill and Finishing Mill areas have now been built.

The centralised pump house for the water treatment plant has been bricked up.

The foundations for the water pump, pipe channels, the pipeline for the final product warehouse and overhead crane have been installed.

Steel structures for the main rolling line have been lifted for installation and the cyclone pool has been excavated.

 

  

The flourishing ESP5 site at Rizhao Steel

  

Rizhao Baohua Steel’s continuous pickling and skin-pass rolling

All signs pointed to the pandemic forcing a month-long postponement of Baohua Steel’s pickling and skin-pass project.

But knowing its client needed startup to happen according to schedule, CISDI’s team adjusted the work plan and refined the breakdown arrangements on a daily basis. Daily summaries, cross-checking and pre-planning meetings ensured no work was delayed.

Steel structures for the workshop building columns were erected five days ahead of schedule.

 

Shandong Fulun Steel’s power plant

Shandong Fulun Steel is building two 65MW ultra-high-temperature, ultra-high-pressure power generators and their auxiliaries.

CISDI is the EPC-based contractor and the contractual schedule is nine and a half months, the fastest of its kind in China.

During the pandemic CISDI ensured the project’s target milestones were hit and enabled the client to maintain production.

The safety of workers was protected at all times. One of the ways CISDI supported this was by running buses to take team members and sub-suppliers between their hotel and the project site.

At the end of March, power generator 2 was started up with power on-grid.

This project will substantially enhance the efficiency of the plant’s gas turbine generation and achieve zero gas emissions, creating a greener and more energy-conserving Fulun Steel.