Investigating the Cause of Poor Efficiency in Thermal Power Plant – A Six-Sigma based Case Study

Manjeet Kharub; Garuav Sharma; Sarat Kumar Sahoo

Manjeet Kharub Asst. Professor, CVR College of Engineering/Mechanical Department, Hyderabad, India
Garuav Sharma Asst. Professor, CVR College of Engineering/Mechanical Department, Hyderabad, India
Sarat Kumar Sahoo Asst. Professor, CVR College of Engineering/Mechanical Department, Hyderabad, India

Abstract

Nowadays, energy in any form has become an essential commodity all over the world. Being a developing country India is facing energy shortage problems. The Indian government is investing into various projects for efficient utilisation of available resources and to improve power plant efficiency. Research scholars and agencies are seeing the quality of thermal power plant is a possible area of improvement. This paper focuses on identifying the causes of capacity waste in a thermal power plant. For this Six-Sigma improvement project, DMAIC (Define-measure-analysisimprove-control) approach has been adopted. The study found low availability of equipment is the primary cause of capacity wastage in a thermal power plant. Various suggestions were provided to reduce equipment availability problem and consequently to improve the plant efficiency.