Background

As Spain’s only potash producer and a cornerstone of Catalonia’s mining industry, ICL Suria processes millions of tons of sylvinite annually to produce critical agricultural fertilizers and industrial salts.

With the majority of production exported globally, the facility’s reliability directly impacts food security and industrial supply chains across Europe. Operating 24/7 with planned maintenance windows just once per month, every hour of uptime matters.

Challenge

New demands without precedent:

When the mine expanded production, the plant suddenly became the bottleneck—required to achieve 95% availability with no historical baseline for this level of performance.

One monthly window for all maintenance:

With 24/7 production and only one planned stop per month, every repair decision carried enormous weight—fix it now and halt production, or risk catastrophic failure.

Limited visibility on critical equipment:

Without continuous monitoring, the team couldn’t anticipate failures or order parts in advance, forcing reactive responses when problems emerged.

The journey

Acting on critical intelligence:

When equipment enters danger status, the team investigates quickly to prevent breakdowns that would halt production.

Creating team ownership:

The team established WhatsApp groups where alerts trigger immediate discussion across the plant, ensuring no notification goes unexamined and everyone is a part of the solution.

Accelerating new talent:

Onboarding new engineers means learning through live alerts—even for equipment they may not have located yet. Real-time notifications teach critical observations that might otherwise take years to develop.