Superintendent Refractory

Designation (Job Title)

Superintendent Refractory

Department

Smelter Refractory

Role

• To oversee installation, repair and replacement of refractory linings within the furnaces and furnace-related equipment in the smelter including the flash furnaces, anode furnaces, twin casting wheel facility as well as equipment items in the Sulphuric Acid Plant and Precious Metals Refinery during operations.
• To oversee planning, procurement and installation of refractory materials during major rebrick shutdowns and commissioning of new projects.
• To embed a culture of quality, safety and sustainability during refractory maintenance through implementation of all Standard Operating Procedures, optimum utilisation of resources and compliance with relevant statutory, safety, health and environment norms.
• To drive performance and continuous training of the Refractory team.

Span of Control and other Dimensions:

Position that the Role reports into

Peers including Position

Direct Reportees

• Manager Smelter Process
• Superintendent Refractory
• Superintendent Technical Smelter
• Superintendent Powerhouse & Utilities
• Superintendent Anode Plant
• Superintendent Flash Furnaces
• Senior Supervisor Refractory FSF/FCF
• Senior Supervisor Refractory Anode Plant

Total

5

2

Job Context

Amman Mineral Industri has a Flash Smelting Furnace (FSF), a Flash Converting Furnace (FCF), Anode Plant and associated utilities in its Copper Smelting unit located at the Sumbawa Island in Indonesia. The smelters convert copper concentrate, received from the Batu Hijau mines in the same island, to copper anodes of the stipulated specification for supply to the Electro Refinery in the same complex for the production of copper cathodes. Sulphuric acid and precious metals, gold, silver, selenium and palladium group metals are byproducts.

This role is responsible for overseeing the installation, repair and replacement of refractory linings within the furnaces and furnace-related equipment in the smelter including the two Flash Furnaces, two Anode Furnaces and the M18 twin casting wheel facility on a regular basis. Responsibilities extend to other refractory-lined equipment at the site such as laboratory furnaces, precious metals refinery furnaces and kilns, and refractory linings and acid-proof linings in the sulphuric acid plant area. This involves overseeing scheduled inspections and condition monitoring for refractory-lined equipment items such as tapholes and taphole inserts, burner blocks, tuyere blocks, launders and casting ladles that need regular repair / replacement. Criticality is in overseeing execution of these repairs with emphasis on maintenance of rotatable spare refractory lined items (launders, casting ladles) to ensure no interruption to operations. Emergency repairs of refractory will be required at times to sustain operation in a safe and controlled manner.

An important element of the role is ensuring planning for major rebrick shutdowns taking into consideration materials, labour, contractors and special equipment. Ensuring contractor management during major rebrick shutdowns is critical. Quality control and inspections of refractory contractors works during shutdowns is an important element of this role. It involves ensuring secondment of frontline members of the team to the contractors teams for upskilling and additional labour when necessary.

This role is responsible for cost control and inventory management for refractory materials (main linings, capital and insurance spares and consumables) in collaboration with supply chain management in view of these particular materials being of extremely high value and some with notably short shelf-life. This role is expected to oversee continuous improvement in the selection, installation, quality and design of refractory linings, especially those integrated with water-cooled copper blocks. This involves working with suppliers and third party SMEs.

This role is expected to oversee and enable continuous training of the refractory team to improve functional and behavioural competences and embed safety awareness.

Sr.

Focus Area

Key Responsibilities

1.

Operational Excellence

• Deciding MOC (Material of construction) for equipment and infrastructure keeping in mind the extreme duty of the furnace refractories and the corrosive nature of the acids being used
• Partnering procurement of quality material in collaboration with the supply chain team through stringent inspection with respect to quality
• Overseeing installation of refractories and anti-corrosion linings within required timelines
• Overseeing preparation and implementation of preventative and predictive maintenance and annual shutdown plans as per the inputs of the Technical team and in coordination with relevant operating departments to maximise machine contribution, plant availability and uptime.
• Overseeing accurate and continuous data recording, root cause analysis and corrective actions
• Overseeing implementation of SOPs and WIs

2.

Compliance & Sustainability

• Reviewing sufficiency and technical viability of refractories and their optimum utilization in view of present and future business and sustainability requirements
• Ensuring good housekeeping practices during refractory maintenance
• Embedding safety culture through the respective refractory teams:
  • Promoting safety awareness through inspections, behaviour-based observations and communication
  • Overseeing analysis of incidents towards achieving zero harm through implementation of safety norms during refractory lining installation and maintenance
  • Overseeing achievement of targeted safety indices through root cause analysis of deviations
• Partnering compliance with environmental guidelines by
  • Overseeing routine maintenance of refractory and anti-corrosion linings to eliminate spillage of molten material and seepage of corrosive acids
  • Overseeing conservation of energy and water during installation and maintenance of refractory lining
• Overseeing improvement initiatives to promote safety, sustainability and improved efficiencies with focus on
  • Risk analysis and mitigation actions

• Continuous improvement initiatives for greater sustainability and efficiency of machines and processes
• Cross functional projects

3.

Profitability and Cost Optimisation

• Preparing Capital Expenditure (CAPEX) budget for new or additional installations of refractory lining
• Overseeing preparation and implementation of the annual operation and maintenance budget based on previous consumption patterns and planned future requirements with regard to repair and maintenance expenses, operating supply of consumables etc.
• Overseeing analysis of consumption, inventory, including spares, and cost of procurement to operate with optimum level of stock and eliminate wastage

• Developing strategy and action plan for substitution of critical and costly spares

4.

Customer Centricity

• Monitoring the condition of refractory linings in flash furnaces and anode furnace as well as furnaces in other process plants in collaboration with the Technical team to assess the need for refractory maintenance / upgrades to minimise downtime
• Overseeing cross functional collaboration at all levels across functions to expedite solutions
• Minimising internal and external customer response time of self and team

5.

Talent Management

• Overseeing deployment of optimum manpower for refractory installation and maintenance through continuous improvement in productivity of team members
• Monitoring performance of the refractory teams and coaching for improvement
• Overseeing identification of training needs and training of the refractory team members to enhance technical and behavioural competencies
• Keeping team motivated to establish good manufacturing practices and autonomous maintenance culture

Key Interfaces:

Interfacing Function

Frequency

Nature

Internal

FSF / FCF and Anode plant teams

Daily

Refractory maintenance

SAP, PMR, ER teams

Weekly

Refractory maintenance

Engineering teams

Daily

Associated civil work

Technical team

Weekly

Refractory condition monitoring

Safety team

Weekly

Embedding safety culture

Logistics

Weekly

Procurement of spares and consumables

External

Refractory contractors

Weekly

Additional labour, equipment and materials

OEMs and Suppliers

Monthly

Equipment and spare related issues

Incumbent Specifications (Preferred)

Education

• Graduate Engineer in Civil/Ceramic Engineering will be an added advantage

Experience

• Minimum 10 years in refractory installation and maintenance with at least 5-7 years experience of leading teams, preferably in non-ferrous smelting

Technical Competencies

• Domain knowledge of refractory
• Leadership and supervisory skills
• Understanding of quality systems and process control tools

Behavioural Competencies

• Planning and organization skills
• Analytical decision making
• Teamwork and collaboration
• Interpersonal effectiveness and Conflict management
• Customer orientation
• Communication
• Time management