RenewiRenewi chooses VDM^XL to professionalise maintenance

Most people know Renewi as the garbage collector, because this is what you see in the streets: the blue and white trucks emptying waste containers. But Renewi is on a mission. They are aiming to become the most prestigious waste-to-product company by avoiding to destroy the waste. This starts by considering waste not as waste. In fact, they say: waste does not exist.

Recycle

Waste is the source of tomorrow’s raw materials. Currently, just a part of all waste processed by Renewi is recycled or used for energy recovery. But that share needs to go up. With the new sorting line, 56% of companies waste can be given a new life. ‘And maintenance also has a role to play in this’, is the firm conviction of Karen Billiet. She is responsible for the proper and reliable functioning of all sorting equipment for the 32 sites in Belgium. ‘These are often old machines, but Renewi is investing 60 million euros in three brand new sorting lines. The first one was built last year at the Renewi site in the port of Ghent.’ Also in Puurs the preparations for a sorting line of similar size started. These investments are supported by stricter Flemish recycling standards. ‘The Ghent site now also has a plastics line to wash and grind the hard plastic into a regrind that can be used as a raw material.’

Sustainability

With the introduction of these advanced sorting lines – with a multitude of parts such as shredders, drum sieves, conveyor belts, infrared separators, etc. – the need for a professional maintenance organisation arose. Billiet was already familiar with the VDM^XL methodology. ‘I believe in the Value Driven Maintenance & Asset Management approach. It is logical and fits in well with Renewi’s sustainability ambitions. We use the professional Asset Management approach, for instance, to extend the lifespan of the installations. In daily operations, we aim for planned maintenance tasks, so that you efficiently use the availability of people, raw materials and other resources. To me that is sustainability.’

Eyeopeners

Billiet is excited about VDM^XL: ‘The methodology helps to set the right priorities and offers a very clear framework that translates well into practice.’ In addition, she made use of the knowledge and expertise of Mainnovation Senior Consultant René Reumerman, who is very experienced with change projects. ‘When the subject of recruitment came up, René intervened. At first I was surprised when he said that I should be very actively involved in this. I was already busy with so many things at the same time, so my assumption was that recruitment would mainly be a Human Resources HR responsibility. But René was right. After all, it does not stop at indicating which skills are important, how many employees are needed and what their executive tasks will be. Doing the assessment yourself, talking to candidates and screening in general are very important if you want to build a new team. After all, you are not only looking for the right skills, but also the right match in terms of culture, vision and standards that you are going to set.’
The size of a workshop or warehouse is also a maintenance issue. ‘The combination of VDM^XL with René’s advices based on practical experience resulted in an estimate of square meters in function of investment value, and also the expected number of spare parts and the expected occupancy. This was again tested in practice.’

Formule 1

VDM^XL also proved to be relevant in communication with management. In fact, in Gent the basis for a completely new organisation was set up. ‘So you start with an almost completely blank page. It really helps if you can demonstrate the added value of such a professional organisation.”
What also was very helpful, was to use the metaphor of a Formula 1 race. Billiet: ‘The pilot (= operations) is in the race to win and for that he needs a good, efficient pit stop (= maintenance). When this is set up properly, downtime is minimal and this immediately contributes to profit. And that is definitely a collective effort. After all, the driver must also choose to take a short break from the race and he will do so because he knows that this is necessary to stay in the race and eventually to win it.’

Future

There definitely is support for Maintenance & Asset Management within the board. ‘We now work with professional EAM software – in this case Ultimo – and based on this we have the availability of important technical information of our assets, we build up valuable history and we secure the preventive maintenance plans. Spare parts management is also handled via Ultimo. the team now consists of about ten employees. Myself and our Reliability Engineer work nationally to manage and support the various local departments,’ says Billiet. The RE function was the first on board in the maintenance team and is included in the operational aorta, the beating heart of the VDM^XL organisation. ‘That was our starting point. From the perspective of reliability, we then proceeded to build up the necessary elements around planning, job execution and spare parts management. We set up the organisation completely based on the VDM^XL competence model. And I can take that schedule and demonstrate that it does indeed work that way. I love it! Our next focus will be on the maintenance organisation in Puurs and we will gradually continue to implement this until all sorting equipment at our Belgian sites are properly maintained.’