BWsC designs power plants on an interdisciplinary database in the system. In that way, all parties involved
in the design always know what changes the
other engineers are making. The result is a
more dynamic and effective design process
which reduces the number of spreadsheets,
the number of e-mails exchanged and the
number of errors. “We achieve a better quali-
ty. We make fewer errors and in that way also
cut down on the amount of time spent. We
get more work done in less time,” says Tech-
nical Manager at BWSC, Claus Albrechtsen, al-
though he is unable to tell exactly how much
money is being saved.
Speaking the same language
As the first large customer in Denmark, BWSC
purchased COMOS from Siemens Industry
Software five years ago. The reason for the
purchase was a growing dissatisfaction with
the company’s existing system, which did not
function optimally as a combined database
system. The mechanical department had one
design program, the electrical department
another, and the instrumentation department
a third. The individual departments used their
own designs and exchanged data via Excel
sheets, which was not a viable solution in the
long run. BWSC therefore began looking for a
system that would enable the company’s 60
design engineers to speak one and the same
digital language.
“We now have an open, object-oriented data-
base system in which everyone works in par-
allel and with parallel data. What is clever
Diesel Engine Power Plant in Kenya, which BWSC designed with the software solution COMOS
Today, all system design at BWSC (Burmeister & Wain Scandinavian
Contractor) is handled in a single database rather than several closed
systems. The result is a more dynamic and effective design process with
fewer errors. By Mor ten Lund, Ingeniøren
All BWSC’s power plants are today designed
using an interdisciplinary software tool. This
has reduced the number of errors and in-
creased productivity, but it has also required
changes to the work processes in the machin-
ery room. When the EPC (Engineering Pro-
curement Construction) company designs a
power plant, it is no longer a lengthy process
in which the mechanical and electrical engi-
neers do their design work in separate closed
systems, laboriously exchanging CAD draw-
ings or spreadsheets by e-mail. Since the
North Zealand turnkey supplier invested in
the COMOS software tool, all system design
has been carried out in a single database.
When the mechanical engineer creates a
pump, the system automatically creates an
electrical object containing e.g. supply and
control signals for the pump, and the electri-
cal engineer can then continue working on
that object.
When one of the engineers updates his data,
the data is simultaneously updated elsewhere »
10 COMOS Plant Manager | 3/2012