Growing trends among companies using industrial thermal processing technologies are prioritizing sustainability and minimizing the environmental impacts of their operations. In response, one industrial boiler equipment manufacturer serving the process industries has developed a sustainability initiative to support manufacturers focused on environmental issues. Cleaver-Brooks will consult with such companies, assess their boiler plant and tailor a solution of sustainable products and services to achieve targets. 

With the trend toward reduced plant personnel, and institutional knowledge leaving many plants as Baby Boomers age out of the workplace, industrial facilities are faced with managing thermal processes with fewer and less experienced operators. At the same time, the influence of on-demand access to all kinds of data in our daily lives is driving demand for access to key performance data and the ability to remotely monitor thermal processes.

Thomas Morris Crafton, president and CEO of Thermcraft Inc., Winston-Salem, N.C., passed away April 28, 2020, following a battle with leukemia. He was 67.

From even before I could actually read, or so my parents tell the story, you could find me with my nose buried in a book. I would tell myself stories in “toddler talk” as I turned the pages of my favorite bedtime stories. 

When I started my junior year of engineering school in the mid ’80s, the lease on the apartment I rented did not start until October. The university was 200 miles from where I grew up, but it just happened that my dad was working at that time in the same city. 

Anyone who has spent even passing time in the Midwest will have noticed a key difference among the seasons. There’s fall (nothing to do), winter (nothing to do), spring (still nothing to do) and festival season — I mean summer.

Back in my college days, I was introduced to Peter F. Drucker and his work on leadership, management, labor and economics. One of his famous quotes has stuck with me: “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” At first glance, that statement seems obvious. But what are those “right things?” What makes a good leader?

As manufacturing facilities increasingly move to automation and advanced manufacturing practices, there is less slack in the system for failures and unplanned downtime. Factories must be ready to operate whenever production requires.

Bepex International designs and manufactures solids processing equipment and systems for the chemical, polymer, food and mineral industries: thermal processing; agglomerating and compacting; mixing; and size reduction. Our goal is to help you get to market faster than your competition.