Issues surrounding the Oil & Gas sector like climate change concerns, high prices and geopolitical uncertainties have forced many countries to seriously focus on alternate sources of energy.

One of the trends in the Energy industry is renewable energy sources—such as solar, wind, and hydro–as their engine of growth.

Already the United States, India, and several European countries have set goals to produce a substantial amount of their electricity using wind energy, making this a truly global phenomenon. For example, the European Union has set their sights on producing 20 percent of their electricity with wind power by 2020.

With this tremendous growth in wind energy, turbine manufacturers have to plan for exponential growth in their throughput. They have to update their manufacturing processes and production facilities to achieve their desired throughput. They have to move toward more automated production facilities and use new technologies like composites and resin transfer molding.

Since this industry is fairly new, it is in an enviable position to adopt cutting edge technologies, without having the weight of legacy data and processes to slow them down.

Wind turbines are the most expensive component of a windmill – costing as much as 75 percent of the total windmill cost.

It is imperative that these components be produced in the most cost-effective manner possible while maintaining the high quality and demand requirements.

By building the product right the first time in a virtual environment, manufacturers can take the guesswork out of validating their latest product design, manufacturing process and production facility—thereby reducing these costs.

Working in a virtual environment, eliminating the need for physical prototypes, scrap and wastage can be completely eliminated. DELMIA provides for a sustainable manufacturing environment minimizing the impact on the environment, making the world a greener place in more ways than one.

Working together I think we can indeed achieve 20% wind power by 2020, don’t you?

Best,

Karun

P.S. There’s more info on energy in general you mind find useful here:

www.plmv5.com/delmiaenergy

I remember Kermit the Frog once sang “it’s not easy being green.” I think a lot of designers would agree. Many would like to be more environmentally conscious, but they’re still under pressure to reduce the cost of materials and speed up design times. The bottom line usually wins over being eco-friendly.

At SolidWorks World 2009, we announced a new product we’ve been working on that was going by the code name “Sage.” It’s a tool that integrates seamlessly into SolidWorks that allows designers to see just how eco-friendly the products they’re designing are.

We’re happy to announce that this new product, officially named SolidWorks Sustainability, is now available in beta form from the SolidWorks Labs website. This is the SustainabilityXpress version that will be included with every version of SolidWorks starting with the release of SolidWorks 2010. SolidWorks Sustainability was designed in collaboration with PE International, and leverages their GaBi database

SolidWorks Sustainability allows the designer to submit data about materials, place of manufacture, and a few other variables to set a baseline for environmental impact. You can then change the materials, country, and so on to see how it changes the impact. Specifically, Sustainability measures:

• Carbon footprint
• Total energy consumed during manufacture
• Effect on air quality, specifically regarding acid rain
• Effect on water quality, specifically regarding algae blooms in coastal waters

The data updates automatically as you change your designs. The “Find Similar” tool even lets you search the built-in material database for close alternatives to the material you have specified, so you don’t have to waste time scrolling through menus. Even if you’re not interested in sustainable design, this could come in handy. And when you’re done, the system generates a report that you can print out, or send to colleagues.

If you’re interested in learning more, visit the SolidWorks Labs site to download the beta version. And finally, here’s a quick video I shot with SolidWorks’ Director of Product Innovation Rick Chin, showing off the program. Enjoy!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything on PLM as an Enterprise Backbone. With the global economy the way it is, it is a good time to be alive, economically speaking. This blog post covers the third pillar of the PLM enterprise backbone: sustainable development and regulatory compliance.

The core product and design data managed in PLM is crucial for today’s businesses to manage for their environmental impacts as well as their ability to comply with regulations.

Eco-Design / Sustainability and Regulatory Compliance require integration of the design and development systems with the extended enterprise to manage product impact across engineering, supply chains, manufacturing, distribution, after-market service and maintenance, as well as end-of-life processes (disposal, energy conversion and / or recycling).

Suppliers and engineering can be incorporated into the material compliance evaluation process to ensure the component library contains the most current material compositions and compliance certifications for supplied parts, such as RoHS (Restriction of the use of certain Hazardous Substances) and WEEE (Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment) in electrical and electronic equipment, IMDS (International Material Data Systems) reporting and ELV (End-of-Life Vehicle) in automotive, and REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals), across many discreet and process manufacturing industries.

Working from a PLM basis, companies can explicitly manage their environment posture, from straight compliance-based, to systematic management, all the way to being full pioneers on the leading edge of industry.

PLM enables companies to implement Design for Compliance functions as an integral part of product development. With PLM solutions, product development teams can check material content information from any design early on and throughout the product development cycle. Reports can be generated to compare the compliance of manufacturing equivalents, list recyclable content, or evaluate best and worst manufacturing locations. This information can be cross-referenced against multiple regulations in all geographies, allowing designers to make changes sooner rather than later.

In medical device markets regulatory compliance also needs to be validated to U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requirements throughout the product introduction process. These regulations cover Corrective and Preventive Actions (CAPAs), Nonconformance Reports (NCRs), Product Complaints, Design Control Deliverables, Design History Files, and Quality Audits. Enterprise-wide change control needs to be in place to manage modifications to all documents, specifications, procedures and product configurations to minimize the risk of FDA audit driven plant shut-downs.

From a regulatory compliance standpoint, PLM needs to be managed as a mission-critical enterprise system.

Product companies can avoid late-stage design changes and explore ways of improving product designs while still meeting compliance requirements. Companies can also reduce or eliminate the use of hazardous materials and substances in their products, thereby avoiding problems such as launch delays, recalls, fines, poor customer satisfaction and a damaged public image.

In addition to regulatory compliance, PLM systems are critical to a company’s overall environmental performance. More than 80% of the ecological impact of a product across manufacturing, usage, maintenance and repair, and end-of-life disposal is determined during initial product design.

Upcoming regulations may even impact the energy efficiency of an entire value-chain, as well as its carbon footprint. This will require companies to manage a portfolio of eco-design initiatives for a product’s material, energy and carbon impacts, necessitating lifecycle analysis and product management through design, sourcing, manufacturing, distribution, and end-of-life processes.

Figures 1 and 2, below, depict a large complex enterprise framework for managing a portfolio of project for sustainable development. Other PLM backbone capabilities come to play including Project and Portfolio Management, Direct Material Sourcing, and Extended Enterprise Collaboration capabilities.

Figure 1: Corporate Level Integrated Environmental Management

Figure 2: Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) across a cradle-to-cradle mapping of the industrial ecosystem

Just a blog article doesn’t really give the space to treat this topic in-depth, but Dassault Systemes is making major investments and initiatives in solutions for Sustainable Development. Those wishing to read further on our company’s approach can review our new corporate report.

The last pillar of PLM as an enterprise backbone will complete the innovation spiral enabled by PLM in a discussion of Integrated New Product Market Launch, as facilitated by PLM.

More later about the fourth pillar of PLM as your enterprise backbone . . .

Best,

Brian

Related posts:

PLM as the Enterprise Backbone: Emerging with Advantage

PLM Enterprise Backbone Pillar 1: Product Portfolio Management

PLM Enterprise Backbone Pillar 2: Working with the Supply Chain