Optimization of Aggregates Supply for Concrete Plants

Abstract

Over the recent years, there is a growing interest in concrete prefabrication. Many of the currently operating concrete plants have implemented systems that increase the quality of manufactured products, have expanded highly automated production lines and have clearly reduced wastes and energy consumption. However, one of the problems often encountered in the construction industry is the inefficient organization of logistics processes. Proper shipments planning of aggregates consisting of the selection of their appropriate quantity and the aggregate stock, corresponding to the needs of concrete plants should contribute to lowering costs. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out the optimization, the aim of which is to minimize costs, as well as to maximize the fulfillment of the degree of expected needs of concrete plants. This paper presents a model that allows purchase strategy optimization of aggregates with different grain size fraction. For research purposes, three separate aggregate stocks and five different concrete plants are considered.

Optimizing transportation in the precast concrete plants

“…In addition, in order to achieve optimization of resources and costs for the precast production of complex configurations, two new ideas have been adopted and incorporated into the mixed-integer linear programming model, namely prefabrication configuration and component groups (Khalli and Chua 2013). Linear programming has also been used in the model for optimizing reinforcement steel supplies for precast concrete plants and aggregate supplies for concrete plants (Nicał 2019;2018a). Despite the extensive and in-depth research in this area, as well as other aspects of precast concrete plant operation regarding risk (Nicał et al 2014), quality management (Nicał and Anysz 2019) and lean concept in manufacturing (Nicał 2018b), there is a lack of research in finding a model of transportation system optimisation for different tonnages between workstations.…”

Optimization of reinforcement steel supply to precast concrete plants

“…The influence of the building information modeling (BIM) on the precast concrete industry, observed in recent years, needs to be considered too (Foremny and Nicał 2013; Nicał and Wodyński 2016;Grzyl et al 2017). These technologies contribute to the increasing improvement of the enterprise resource planning (ERP) method in concrete precast plants, including the material requirements planning (MRP) standard, which is responsible for resource planning in the preproduction phase (Nicał 2018a(Nicał , 2018b. Although BIM and RFID enriched ERP, some pragmatic problems still cannot be solved (Zhiliang and Zhitian 2015).…”