Loss Prevention
Consider a systematic approach for safety monitoring
Any facility dealing with bulk hydrocarbons must monitor safety conditions at all times. A leak of flammable or toxic material can occur at any time, and explosion is an ever-present threat when combu..
Case history: Quantifying the benefits of alarm management
By using timely alarms that lead an operator to corrective actions, the goals are to improve plant safety, to increase efficiency and to reduce environmental constraint limit violations.
Recommended guidelines can help prevent fires caused by static electricity
For any person working in the oil and gas industry who is responsible for the safety of employees, colleagues, plant equipment and property, one of the most potentially confusing aspects in providing ..
Update temperature control for a Claus unit with neural networks
The Natref oil refinery in Sasolburg, South Africa, had experienced refractory problems in the sulfur recovery unit’s (SRU’s) combustion chamber since startup (Fig. 1). Even though the SRU w..
HP Reliability: Maintain proficiency in root-cause-failure analysis
Earlier in the year, the author attended a series of client and organizers’ presentations at the 2013 TapRooT Summit in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. TapRooT is a structured failure analysis and trouble..
HP Integration Strategies: Operational integrity management at Statoil
Asset-intensive industries continue to suffer from unplanned downtime, failure to meet planned production rates, and too many safety and environmental incidents. Until companies can manage and mitigat..
HP Automation Safety: MTTR: Reality vs. calculation
Many reliability engineers trained before IEC 61508 know the acronym MTTR as “mean time to repair.” I certainly learned that definition. Naturally, I think of the time it takes to repair som..
HP Viewpoint: IT/OT integration—Is it safe?
Information technology (IT) includes conventional computers, operating systems, networking components and software platforms. All IT developments continue to increase in importance for industrial cont..
HP Impact: Statoil issues report on In Amenas terrorist attack
Statoil’s board has concluded an investigation into the terrorist attack at the BP gas plant in In Amenas, Algeria. The investigation team visited the In Amenas plant on April 16 and issued its f..
Mitigate fouling in crude unit overhead—Part 1
In a refinery crude distillation column, up to 40% of the total heat removal may be found in the tower overhead condenser. The quantity of duty available makes heat integration (HI) between the column..
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