Costs, administration equipment

Fixed costs are those elements of piece cost that are a function of the annual production volume. Fixed costs are called fixed because they typically represent one-time capital investments (buildings, silos, processing machines, etc.) or annual expenses unaffected by the number of products produced (building rent, engineering support, administrative personnel, etc.). Typically, these costs are distributed over the total number of products produced in a given period. For plastics processes the principal elements are main machine cost, auxiliary equipment cost, tooling cost, building cost, overhead labor cost, maintenance cost, and the cost of capital. 

In this analysis, the cost components considered are equipment, consumables, maintenance, labor, support personnel, and administrative costs. The equipment costs include depreciation, moves and rearrangements, floor space, and training. Consumables consider utilities, chemicals, supplies and waste disposal. Maintenance includes maintenance labor, parts, vendor service contracts, vendor training and software. Labor is the cost of operators. Support personnel costs consist of engineering, supervision and contract labor. Administrative costs include insurance, taxes and interest. 

Total Capital Cost The installed cost of the fixed-capital investment Cpc is obviously an essential item which must be forecast before an investment decision can be made. It forms pai4 of the total capital investment Cfc, defined by Eq. (9-14). The fixed-capital investment is usually regarded as the capital needed to provide all the depreciable facihties. It is sometimes divided into two classes by defining battery limits and auxiliaiy facilities for the project. The boundary for batteiy limits includes all manufacturing equipment but excludes administrative offices, storage areas, utihties, and other essential and nonessential auxihaiy facilities. 

Although many engineers provide only the minimum adequate vessel design to minimize costs, it is inherently safer to minimize the use of safety interlocks and administrative controls by designing robust equipment. Passive hardware devices can be substituted for active control systems. For example, if the design pressure of the vessel system is higher than the maximum expected pressure, an interlock to trip the system on high pressure or temperatures may be unnecessary. 

Equipment maintenance costs What are the costs and administrative burdens to test and maintain equipment ... 

Definitive diagnosis comes at a cost. QA/QC expenses, regulatory expenses, and patent royalty expenses are high, as are supply costs for consumables, reagents, and test kits. Morever, the equipment required for assay and result delivery and accuracy can be expensive. In the sections that follow, an outline of how these costs are calculated is provided and an effort is made to flesh out a difficult area to quantify. Generally, test costs, neglecting administration and overhead, can be... 

In addition to considerations of impairment testing systems and the equipment and platform to administer the systems, the implementation of the testing system must also be considered. Test cost, frequency of administration, maintenance of stable patterns of performance (i.e., motivation), and worker acceptance are among the issues that merit consideration.11 In addition, concerns regarding the legal status of performance test systems, the manner in which labor unions and arbitrators might view such test systems, and whether there is a potential for misuse of the test system could affect system implementation.9... 

An acceptable plant design must present a process that is capable of operating under conditions which will yield a profit. Since net profit equals total income minus all expenses, it is essential that the chemical engineer be aware of the many different types of costs involved in manufacturing processes. Capital must be allocated for direct plant expenses, such as those for raw materials, labor, and equipment. Besides direct expenses, many other indirect expenses are incurred, and these must be included if a complete analysis of the total cost is to be obtained. Some examples of these indirect expenses are administrative salaries, product-distribution costs, and costs for interplant communications. 

Annual direct production costs for this process (with the exception of raw material and steam costs) plus costs for plant overhead, administration, office help, distribution, and contingencies are 480,000 per year. This 480,000 includes the cost of operating any vacuum equipment and is unchanged even if vacuum is not used in the process. 

The cost of manufacturing thermoformed, polystyrene foam sheet parts is less dependent on raw material cost than other extrusion processes. This is largely due to the combined effects of additional energy costs required to operate two extruders, heat removal requirements in the secondary extruder, cost of pelletizing (densifying) regrind and the relatively low output of the process for the equipment scale and cost. Typical cost factors for the manufacture of thermoformed polystyrene foam sheet products include raw materials 35%, labor 27%, sales and administration 16%, depreciation 8%, utilities 7% and other 7%. 

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