Economic feasibility study of an automation migration in case of a coal handling plant

The Economic feasibility is very important factor in any decision making related to a new project. This paper tries to high light the case in which economic feasibility is studied before switching over to an automated system from a manual system i.e. Automation Migration in case of a process industry. The main aim here is to shift from manual system to automated system for a coal handling plant (CHP) in a thermal power plant of the company. A thorough economic analysis is carried out for three recent years for the existing manual system & investment on new system is studied. Comparison for both the manual system & automated system is carried out in terms of operating cost & fixed cost. It is very clearly found out that it is enough advantageous to migrate from manual system to automated system. Many other factors are also responsible for this migration other than the economic considerations. Ex: human health and safety issues, labor issues, reliability, railway norms etc.