Achieving lower inventory levels

The treatment must be designed to remove the cause, not the symptom. We need to develop a system that meets the following general requirement  

We need to reach the point where low inventory levels are inherent in the system we work in and where the upper limit is set by management. 

This system is run by the SCM which is given the responsibility for the amount of inventory. 

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You will not have any negative surprises. Considerably lower inventory levels, less storage space and lower interest charges are the easily achievable benefits. 

In the beginning, supply chain excellence was defined as the lowest manufactured cost. The belief was that supply chain excellence could be achieved by sweating the assets. This set of beliefs formed the foundation for the efficient supply chain. Through the evolution of supply chain processes, costs were reduced, inventory levels lowered, and waste eliminated however, each company reached a point where they could no longer just cut costs without trading off service to customers. They had reached their effective frontier. 

The residual inventory in Zone 2A outside of the SCBs is represented by an airborne concentration of 51 microcuries of iodine, which is the only specie with significant volatility. This inventory level represents a decontamination factor of 10,000 relative to the average contamination levels in the SCBs during processing operations, which should be readily achievable given that proper airflows are maintained in the HCF. Normal ventilation system operation will continuously sweep out airborne materials, and will provide airflow across surfaces that would tend to pick up any readily volatized material. It is likely that the airborne contamination levels will be much lower than that assumed here and that any residual contamination on Zone 2A surfaces would likely remain in place following a DBE. 

Eight samples of un-irradiated reactor pressure vessel (RPV) steel, two each from Trawsfynydd (TRA), Dungeness A (DNA), Sizewell A (SXA) and Bradwell (BWA) reactors were analysed. ICP-MS analysis was carried out using a high resolution magnetic sector instrument. Despite the sensitivity of this method, i.e. lower limit of detection (LLD) of around 8 pg g for procedural blanks, it failed to detect Li and achieved a detection limit of 80 ng g, which was well above the level of interest. However, the results were consistent and did show that the Li concentration was well below that found from the earlier analytical attempts (ICP-OES) and below the levels conservatively assumed in the waste inventory assessments. 

The wt.% vanadium removed varied from approximately 5-25% and correlated well with the amount of trap in inventory (Figure 6). In all cases, the targeted amount of RV4+in inventory was 5%. While much of our laboratory work was done with 10% blends, a 5% blend was chosen for the commercial trials to minimize possible dilution effects. Several units did not attain the 5% level due to previously scheduled turnarounds. In two of the cases where the targeted level was achieved, Trials A and G, vanadium removal exceeded 20%. Interestingly, the partial burn operation, Trial F, was not that much lower than the full bum operations. 

The two steady-state runs were performed at a constant methanol conversion (above 99.9%) and coke level. Catalyst makeup rate was lower than 0.5 wt% of catalyst inventory/day. Olefin yields higher than 60 wt% can be achieved at lower pressures, and by the use of diluents. Both options were not possible in the modified 100 B/D MTG plant, but were demonstrated in the smaller pilot plants. 

For example, a manufacturer whose product availability is poor and order cycle times inconsistent may force wholesalers to carry more inventory as safety stock in order to offer an acceptable level of service to the retailers. In this case, lower logistics costs for the manufacturer were achieved at the expense of other members of the supply chain, and the entire supply chain may be less efficient. 

To achieve the lowest transportation costs to the warehouse, the decision was made in this example to order only in truck load quantities (TL). In this example, that means that 15,000 units are ordered at one time. Since delivery time to the warehouse is one week, this means that the safety stock is still 363 if there is one warehouse, so the ROP is 15,363 units. The average inventory in the warehouse is the beginning inventory plus the ending inventory divided by two. If there is one warehouse, this is (15,363 + 363)/2 = 7,823 units. The ending inventory is 363 because this is the level of the safety stock and it is equally probable that the inventory will be higher than this as it is that the inventory will be lower than this. Regardless of the number of warehouses in the system, there will be a total of 28 deliveries to the warehouses, when the deci-... 

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