In 2008, as a result of a re-alignment of grain handling terminals in British Columbia, Cargill Inc. acquired sole possession of a large terminal elevator on the North Shore in the Port of Vancouver. The facility had been built in the late 1960s and had minimal hazard monitoring equipment installed. Cargill has a strict policy to not have employees operate in a work environment without a fully functioning safety monitoring system in place. Based upon past installations in

Cargill chose CMC for a solution to their operational needs.

The North shore terminal consisted of a large workhouse with three annexes and two shipping berths. After consulting with CMC and assessing that just over 1,700 points in the terminal needed to be monitored, work began immediately on the project. The nature of CMC’s monitoring system allowed contract electricians to purchase materials and proceed with installation of the monitoring network without the need for engineering drawings.

Two teams of electrical contractors started laying cable tray, one from the bottom of the elevator up and the second from the top of the elevator down. Working with plant personnel and utilizing Cargill’s comprehensive policy for hazard monitoring, a systems integrator prepared equipment lists indicating the locations where sensors were required. The electricians mounted the field interconnect enclosures next to the required sensor locations and connected the enclosures together with armored CAT5 cable.

The installation went smoothly and the majority of the sensors were installed in the first three months. In April of 2009 an additional 500 sensors were added to the project and their installation was fully complete by the end of May of 2009.

Today the Cargill system is fully integrated with the elevator’s computerized process control system. Equipment is automatically stopped when a hazard is detected. The majority of equipment in the elevator is monitored including belts, bucket elevators, moving trippers and a number of fan bearings.Since installation CMC’s monitoring system detected problems that were hidden from normal sight such as a dust fan operating with a hot bearing and a bucket elevator belts that were out of alignment. At one point a bucket elevator pulley shaft broke during operation and CMC’s sensors immediately sensed the problem shutting down the leg.

The hazard monitoring sensors in Vancouver required a very large electronic system with miles of wiring and thousands of components. To date the system has been very reliable with no significant operational issues reported.

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