Valmet, a leading global provider of industrial technologies and services for the pulp, paper, and energy sectors, utilized Flyability's Elios drone for inspecting a recovery boiler. This innovation not only cut costs but also provided access to otherwise unreachable areas.

Key Benefits at a Glance

Overview

Valmet ranks among the top providers worldwide of industrial technologies and services for the pulp, paper, and energy industries.

In their operations, they install large-scale equipment such as boilers, tanks, and digesters. Additionally, they offer ongoing maintenance and servicing for this equipment, with routine inspections being a critical component of maintaining the functionality and reliability of these assets. These inspections help detect issues early, preventing disruptions in plant operations.

Conducting inspections can be expensive and time-consuming due to the necessity of constructing scaffolding to enable inspectors to access every part of the boiler or tank under scrutiny. Downtime during these inspections can incur significant costs, sometimes amounting to up to a million dollars per day for a single boiler.

Customer Requirements

As inspections form a vital part of their annual maintenance routines, Valmet consistently seeks ways to enhance the efficiency of the inspection process.

In exploring innovative methods for boiler and tank inspections, Valmet chose to trial the Elios drone to assess how its distinctive collapsible cage—designed to withstand collisions while maintaining flight capabilities—could improve inspections in confined spaces like boilers.

Valmet inspectors based in Mörrum, Sweden, required a scheduled inspection of a recovery boiler and decided to employ the Elios for this task.

The boiler is a massive structure standing sixty meters tall. Its walls consist of pipes filled with circulating water, forming a cooling framework. Black liquor is fed into the furnace through nozzles and combusted at high temperatures.

Shutting down the boiler for inspection costs up to a million dollars a day, making each minute saved during the outage critical. To expedite the shutdown process, staff work in back-to-back shifts, beginning at night and handing over to the next team in the morning, continuing until the outage concludes.

Constructing scaffolding for access to every part of the boiler presents challenges due to numerous small components at both the top and bottom and tight spaces to navigate. Considering these complexities, building the scaffolding takes two to three days, during which the boiler remains offline. Scaffolding construction also incurs expenses—costing $20,000 for each inspection.

The Solution

The Elios drone was employed to inspect the boiler, enabling inspectors to begin the inspection immediately without needing to construct scaffolding.

With the Elios, inspectors were able to fly into tight areas around the top and bottom of the boiler and gather insights about their condition without needing to stand on scaffolding or crawl through narrow spaces with a flashlight.

Results

The boiler inspection proved successful, with inspectors praising the quality of the images captured by the Elios.

During the night shift, inspectors collaborated with the Flyability team to develop and adhere to an inspection plan aimed at capturing visual data of the entire boiler.

The Elios drone was flown for two hours inside the boiler, recording video footage of every burner and pipe, along with the entire surface area of the asset. The visual data was then processed to extract valuable insights, which were incorporated into the inspection report.

This report was handed over to the morning shift workers, allowing them to identify specific burners and openings that needed closer inspection. The report also assisted in pinpointing areas requiring urgent repairs, enabling Valmet personnel to commence work immediately, thereby boosting the overall efficiency and speed of the maintenance procedure.

Conclusion

Valmet personnel are already envisioning additional inspection scenarios where the Elios drone could be applied. Below are some examples of assets they have suggested where the Elios could assist in manual inspections:

• Recovery boilers can accumulate substantial deposits at the top of their furnaces, posing significant risks for entry. The Elios could be used for an initial evaluation of conditions inside a recovery boiler to facilitate a safety assessment prior to entry.

• Power boilers of the circulating fluidized bed type utilize a cyclone to recirculate bed material, making them challenging to inspect due to limited accessibility. Flying the Elios within these boilers might eliminate the need for manual inspections in these areas.

• Ash hoppers can be extremely hazardous locations for manual inspections. With the Elios, there may no longer be a requirement for someone to physically enter a hopper for an inspection.

 

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