Reducing Sunflower Oil Production Disturbances

This paper addresses the desired performance of the production of sunflower oil from sunflower seeds. This research is performed to improve the stability of the production process by removing the disturbances. After identifying the restrictions on the input and output of the production process, it was found that full meal silos were the largest disturbance. New design solutions were obtained by analysing the current state and subsequently develop new design alternatives. A discrete event simulation model was developed to compare the performance of the new designs through the predefined KPIs. It was found that increasing the available storage space and improving the efficiency of the outbound logistics the disturbance on the oil production could be reduced. The best design solution was creating a by-pass that allows for simultaneously loading of trucks and vessels, which focuses on increasing the available loading hours.