- POSCO ICT tries to apply IoT · Big Data · AI and so on to the power plant operated by POSCO Energy
- Real-time facility data collection and big data used to provide optimal operation condition
 
POSCO Energy (CEO Park Ki Hong) and POSCO ICT (CEO Choi Do Hwan) will collaborate to build the first smart power plant in Korea.
 
Their technology and experience in implementing smart factories mostly at production sites are now expanded to power plants. As a result, using big data analysis technology, they can predict the power plant’s performance in real time and detect facility malfunctions ahead of time through malfunction prediction model implementation.
 
Since last year, both companies have been pursuing projects to combine advanced ICT such as IoT, big data and AI with Incheon LNG complex power plant # 5 ~ 9 and by-product gas power plants in Gwangyang steel factory operated by POSCO Energy until recently. It means that they are now equipped with a data-oriented facility operation system that can collect various site data such as temperature, vibration and pressure at high speed from main facilities such as power generator, turbines, pumps and motors and analyze them with big data. Consequently, by performing real-time monitoring of the main facilities and assessing the signs of malfunction accordingly, they are now able to predict the optimal time of maintenance works and minimize the downtime of power plants for periodic facility maintenance works, which leads to the improved efficiency of power generation.
 
In addition, by providing optimal operation guidance for each individual facility, the efficiency of power generation is maximized. By performing real-time analysis of factors that greatly affect the operation performance of the main facilities of power plant such as gas turbines and steam turbines and assigning optimal operation condition accordingly, they can improve the efficiency of power generation.  
 
POSCO ICT is collaborating with POSCO Energy to pursue the application of AI starting this year. By deriving the optimal operation condition for each facility and performing deep learning, they aim to manage the entire facilities comprehensively and maximize the operation competitiveness of the power plant eventually.

According to an authority from POSCO Energy, experience-oriented facility operation according to the existing manufacturer’s design criteria is now switched to site data-based operation. As a result, they can expect great economic improvement in the power plant, he added.
 
“Based on the POSCO group’s smart industry platform called  ‘PosFrame,’ we are aggressively pursuing projects such as smart factory, smart building and city and smart energy. Along with the smart power plant project, we will continue to implement Smart X solutions applicable to many industrial areas such as Smart Management, Market Network, Blockchain and so on,” an authority from POSCO ICT said.