AM-97-63 SA ONSTREAM A KEY TO IMPROVING OPERATIONAL RELIABILITY

Description:

Every day, every year, petroleum refineries, chemical plants, and other high-technology processing plants generate enormous amounts of data. When analyzed, the data reveal pathways to improve plant performance and increase margins. Some industries have pooled this data for the benefit of all. For example, the electronics industry for years has used a US Government-sponsored data base to enrich the remarkable reliability of avionics and weapons systems. Power generation plants have also been rewarded by their data pooling. Contrasting with this success is essentially a void of data about mechanical and electrical equipment used in process plants. Except for an offshore oil operations data base OREDA, and limited reliability analyses by the Center for Chemical Process Safety (American Institute of Chemical Engineers), process plant engineers have little historical data to use for equipment selection and maintenance decisions. It costs money to collect this information which has significant residual value -- in other words, a corporate asset. Should assets be discarded without receiving anything in return? Definitely not. These data assets should be saved and reused many times. This is not being done adequately in much of the process industry. Little data about equipment and its performance is retained and organized in a way which can be conveniently converted to information for making good decisions. Enormous sums of money are at stake when the best equipment and care techniques are unknown because there is no historical data. There is good news, however. Forward thinkers in the process industries are keenly aware of the value of data. They have committed to set things right and have taken the first step. That is what this paper is about.