Similarly, the laboratory is staffed around the clock. The modern cement plant requires smooth control in order to operate at its optimum level. As importantly, smooth operations allow Arizona Portland Cement to provide our customers with reliable, consistent cement. A distributed computer control system allows one supervisor to control the entire process from the Central Control Building. The system performs both analog and digital control.
Digital control includes items such as motor starts and stops, interlocking, and alarming.
Analog controls include instrumentation such as thermocouples or pressure taps and PID loops which automatically hold a process variable to a setpoint. Additionally, the Rillito plant has an expert system, or fuzzy logic, for even further automatic control. Coal, alumina, and iron materials normally arrive by rail while gypsum and some other materials may be trucked into Rillito. In addition to rigorously following all federal, state and county regulations, Arizona Portland Cement is a member of Climate Wise, a volunteer group of companies working with the United States Environmental Protection Agency to reduce greenhouse gases. Arizona Portland believes in recycling and waste minimization.