[Originally published on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/office-diaries-excess-anything-bad-dr-a-k-srivastava/
Some 16 years back, I retired after 34 years of service. During my career, after spending about a quarter of professional-life in Research & Development, I opted to be transferred to the Business Development wing. Here, I headed business operations of a division which was a pioneer in development of indigenous know-how and production and marketing of a group of 8 speciality-chemicals called catalysts and other chemicals, those were widely used in the Industry. These were used in many process industries, including Fertilizers & Chemicals, Refineries, etc. The other competitors in the fields were big multinationals, having operations worldwide, some having manufacturing facilities in India and others were imported. I will be describing real-life situations and what lessons future managers may learn.
In Indian scenario, in most of the process- industry plants, corrosive materials, such as high concentration Acids, Alkali and other Chemicals, are handled with special treatment as one of raw materials or final products. To avoid corrosion of the surfaces, like floors, including weight bearing surfaces for movement of trollies etc., walls, roofs etc. normally ceramic tiles are used and they are joined with a silicon-adhesive. They have a relatively good life-span on the average of 3-5 years with intermittent repairs. As tiles are heavy in weight and give way easily due to slight leakage, mechanical impact or breakage, whenever they need attention, the plant has to be shut-down to undertake the repairs, even for comparatively smaller areas, causing great financial and frequent operational dis-advantage.
We had developed an epoxy-based coating system to tackle such a corrosive environment, which would be chemically-efficient, cost-effective, easy in first time laying and subsequent repairs, if required. The product was an indigenously developed Organic polymer based combination of epoxy adhesive and hardner system. The hardner had variable compositions, depending upon the different chemical corrosive environments around and type of the surface. It was widely used successfully in many Chemical plants like Urea Prilling-Towers, Urea silos, Neutralization Pits, DM Water Treatment plants, other Acid-Alkali handling areas, and many other chemicals and fertilizers plants, in refineries etc. It was many times more cost effective per sq meter than originally planned. It, in fact, led to more than two decades of trouble-free operations.
In process plants, it is very easy to get a big job done from vendors, as bigger fortunes are involved. But for smaller specialized-jobs for repairs, getting a specialist service- provider quickly is difficult. If due to any reason, during operation if some small coating-area had given way, the affected-area was immediately painted with brush with the spare-product (shelf-life of more than 5 years). In many cases the hardener was so modified that it sets quickly- dried, almost immediately, even under immersed-water conditions, avoiding any stoppage / shutdown of the plant. In some refineries in Eastern India, they were so satisfied with the product and its actual performance that they issued “Performance- Certificates” of satisfactory performance of more than 24 years, subsequently the product was tried in other units, with repeat orders.
But with the great performance for longer periods, the order book-position started dwindling soon. The management desired higher turn-over. Production staff was sitting idle. Plant was running on low capacity or completely stopped. The management, under the situation, could not wait for longer and soon shifted some of the operators elsewhere to other operations/ plants. The real heroes of this magnificent product- the scientists,who developed the know-how, took voluntary retirement and some retired. It saw the death of a promising and efficient Chemical system.
Excess of anything, even may be the good quality product, should be avoided.