Photo: Ecssa
Hot-wash system in Haiti has been running smoothly for several weeks – Joint recycling project with Lavergne and Hewlett Packard (HP)
Around 8,100 kilometers separate Haiti and Aicha vorm Wald. Anyone travelling there can easily spend more than a full day on an aircraft. For several employees of STF Group, this trip had already been firmly scheduled, because a hot-wash system from the Lower Bavarian company was due to be installed in Haiti this spring together with Lavergne Group and HP. However, coronavirus disrupted the entire plan. Putting the project on hold was not an option for the STF Group team.
“We decided to take a new approach,” says Dirk F. Leiber, Sales Director at STF Maschinen- und Anlagenbau GmbH, “and therefore carried out a remote installation for the first time in the company’s history.” This means that the system was assembled and installed via video link between Aicha vorm Wald and Haiti. Every individual step of the installation work could be followed remotely – almost as if being live on site. “In addition, daily video conferences took place between us, Lavergne in Canada, HP in the USA, and the executing engineers and workers from Ecssa in Haiti,” reports the Sales Director. After around ten weeks of intensive work, the installation was successfully completed and a small opening ceremony was held. Since then, the machine has been running smoothly and cleaning several million plastic flakes every day. “The flakes are washed at 65 to 85 degrees and then recycled further. HP uses the recycled flakes in various HP products, which conserves resources and protects the environment,” explains Dirk F. Leiber. The Sales Director is, of course, also very proud of the “team” for ensuring that the first remote commissioning went so smoothly: “This type of installation was new territory for me as well. But it is interesting to see what is possible with today’s technology.”
STF Group will continue to follow this approach, as work is already under way on the second remote installation after the successful premiere. “Shortly before Christmas, we began installing two washing systems and one sorting system in Hong Kong,” says Dirk F. Leiber. And even though almost 9,000 kilometers separate the two locations, the STF team is closely involved.