SHEM chooses InUse to digitize the preventive maintenance of its small hydropower plants

Paris, France – InUse announces the selection of its connected maintenance application by SHEM (Hydropower producer based in the South of France), part of ENGIE group. Named SMAP (SHEM Maintenance Planner), this application makes the equipment from hydroelectric plants talk in order to improve their performance by guiding the technicians towards the best actions to realize. Results: maintenance are optimized leading to better performance and optimization of technicians’ field trips.

Start-up created in 2015, InUse offers a SaaS application that is based on the digitalization of industrial know-how and the processing of data from equipment. The application delivers connected services to meet the challenges of production sites.

In order to increase the availability and thus the production of its small hydropower plants, the SHEM launched a call for projects at the end of 2016, won by InUse. Then came the creation of SMAP, a connected maintenance application dedicated to the operation of hydroelectric plants.

Deployed within 12 hydropower plants in 6 months, the application integrates SHEM’s expertise in preventive maintenance, modeled through 2,800 maintenance actions. SMAP also gives the factories the ability to automatically request the maintenance interventions they need from the technicians according to the actual use of the equipment, thus optimizing the numerous trips of the technicians who regularly visit the different sites operated by SHEM.Guided by contextualized work instructions and digitized technical documentation, the technicians benefit from an advanced remote assistance to realize the maintenance operations.

As a plant operator, SHEM can now easily analyze the output of all of its plants and quantify the additional availability gains earned. 

“Thanks to SMAP, we are able to mobilize our technicians at the right moment according to the needs automatically raised by our factories. Digitization also allows us to significantly increase our responsiveness by making accessible by all, operator, expert, manager, the performance of plants. We have increased the availability of teams with a gain that we estimate today of 5% which equates to ten days of additional production at the scale of one year” says Julien Legendre, head of the project concessions department at SHEM.

With this successful deployment, SHEM intends to offer SMAP to independent producers to improve the performance of their plants. An approach in which the application of InUse makes sense according to Laurent Couillard, co-founder and general manager of the start-up: “Our application is a great lever for manufacturers who wish to enhance their know-how and generate new revenues through connected services. We are proud to accompany SHEM in this initiative which will ultimately produce more renewable energy. 

About SHEM

SHEM (Société Hydro-Électrique du Midi) is the 3rd largest producer of hydroelectricity in France, mainly located in the greater south-west, which employs around 320 people. Its 56 plants and 12 large dams, spread over the Pyrenees, the Lot and Dordogne rivers, produce clean energy without CO2 emissions, certified 100% renewable by the independent certification organisation TÜV-SÜD.