The Challenge

Before adopting Irion, Axpo’s energy production planning was a manual process that involved many operators. The Toller Process Optimization (TPO) was constantly on hold to be able to read information from the energy distribution site manager. Data accuracy had to be verified, file formats had to be converted and then transferred from the production system, while managing failures, causing a repetitive process. Files could not be saved or traced internally and so it was possible to control invoices for reconcilation between requests and actual energy production. The power plants were operating based on energy needs. Axpo had to verify the balances between the energy distribution manager request and how much the plant was producing, in a time consuming and inefficient way.

The Solution – Irion

Irion demonstrated to be the optimal tool for our client’s challenges because of its intrinsic capabilities: it can integrate information in any format and from any type of source, verify conguency and accuracy, transform data into the right format and distribute it across different systems. The entire process can be audited and monitored at any stage, for efficient tracking that is fast and complete. The flexibility of the platform allows for designers to evolve solutions according to any new requirements that may arise. Irion provides high productivity, with respect to the average tools on the market, and uses a business oriented approach for requirements and processes, in order to drastically reduce complexity of the technical environment.

The Benefits

Irion has provided Axpo with an automatic system for sharing production plans between energy distribution mangers and each power plant, from the Dynamic Production Unit register and the half-bands.The system interacts with a web service, which downloads the input energy data from a portal and reconciles the information between energry distribution manager requests, daily production plans and final customers. With an easy to use dashboard, Axpo can control and manage the process interactively, with notifications received via email for event alerts.

With Irion, Axpo ha s ahceived these main results:

• Optimization of the entire energy distrbution system, using timely and accurate data management
• 80% reduction in costs related to managing disparate invoicing from different business functions due to better data quality
• Increased worker productivity and work shift optimization (no over time, reducing repetitive and manual activities and increasing productivty & team collaborations)
• Production process optimization; the solution was extended to integrate a weather provider capability for more efficient analysis and statistics for production