AM-14-11 Alarm Upgrades VIA Rationalization

Description:

This paper covers the initial analysis of alarm rationalization for the entire Access Pipeline system and the results of one site near Christina Lake, Alberta, which helped reduce the operation’s configured alarms and improve its alarm rate. This decision was based on reducing the overall designed alarm count by reducing duplicate and redundant alarm. The secondary benefit was to have engineered designed alarms. Access Pipeline’s alarm rationalization effort was initiated at the operational level and developed into a wider initiative supported by upper management. Rationalization work addressed the alarms in the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) alarm system and controllers which ensured ownership of the alarm problem at the operational level since this is the controller interface. During this project, strategies were developed to minimize the rationalization effort, maximize the use of participants’ time, and still deliver expected results.