Shutdowns and Turnarounds 2016 will tackle the key challenges, including:

Shutdowns and Turnarounds 2016 will tackle the key challenges, including:

• Scope Management: Align departmental diversity and develop a system to align scope from planning through to execution
  
• Maintenance: Techniques to reduce expenditure by executing robust day-to-day inspections, repairs and program implementation
  
• Lessons Learned: Capturing data and implementing the lessons learned to improve the efficiency of your next turnaround project
• Contractor Management: Overcome communicative and cultural challenges with your contractors while ensuring quality assurance
  
• Health and Safety: Ensure quality control to and safety standard to avoid reputational damage

7 Effective Tips for Better Plant Turnaround Safety

June 12, 2013 By Lukman Nulhakiem

Plant turnaround safety is the big thing that should be in the first consideration when turnaround works are planned. Without involving this factor in the planning stage, turnaround goals will never be achieved. In the turnaround a lot of works are done at the same time by huge numbers of people with various kinds of behavior and skills. Those works are different type works which have different potential hazards. And one work with another work form a sequence and affect each other.
So, it is very essential to put serious efforts on plant turnaround safety. Day by day such efforts should be improved continuously since every turnaround will deals with different situation even though there will be some same work items in the schedule.
Change of person in charge, equipment lifetime, new equipment installation and new chemical usages are some factors that influence plant turnaround safety. Such thing is commonly happened in a yearly plant maintenance program.

Think the Following Plant Turnaround Safety Tips

Improving and reconsidering  your efforts for the plant turnaround safety is the best thing you should always do.
Read the following plant turnaround safety tips. After that re-thinking of what you have done so far and start to make improvement on what you have done.
Tips #1 Provide enough time for preparation.
Ideally, 4 months before turnaround, you have started your preparation works. Yes, I said 4 months. More that that number is recommended. Why? Because, for example, you have to purchase new oxygen detector if yours is broken. Consider required time for the worst case.
Check all of safety tools, equipments and apparatus during the preparation phase and make sure you have left nothing on this. Having a plant turnaround checklists is highly recommended. It will make everything easier to do.
Tips #2 Look at the plant shut down day.
You may have limited time to do process safety just after plant shut down before turnaround started. Do your best effort to reduce as many as potential hazards (chemical, physical, biological and others hazards) during the shut down day. Reduce them to the acceptable level.
Check the schedule which item will be opened and overhauled. Ensure that no high temperature, high pressure nor hazardous chemical left inside. The plant shut down day is your biggest change to do so.
Tips #3 Make the safest work sequences.
This can not be achieved except through good coordination among departments. Never allow hot work done at the same time in a close to a work that involves flammable material. Find the most acceptable work sequences from the stand point of safety and productivity.
Tips #4 Re-educate all of employees about safety in turnaround
Turnaround is done once a year and in many cases more than one year. One year is enough for people to get forget about safety precautions during turnaround. Employees need to be refreshed about  plant turnaround safety.
Include also emergency response procedure in the education topic.
Tips #5 Don’t forget to educate contractors, project workers and guest about safety in the plant.
During the turnaround, outside resources are commonly involved for special works like compressor overhaul, instrument calibration and new piping installation.
Those people should be informed about your plant nature, especially potential hazards, safety procedures, organization structure and communication hierarchy.
Tips #6 Get back up fire fighting facility
Fire fighting facility back up is necessary while your own facilities in the plant are being repaired, maintenance or overhauled.
Getting help for that may be no problem if the plant operates in an industrial estate where integrated fire fighting facilities and service are available.
In the worst case, you need to spare more time and cost to hire such facility, which is far away from the plant site.
Tips #7 Communicate safety intensively and extensively during the turnaround.
Provide special safety slogans, safety talk messages and safety banners for the turnaround. Make all of people the in the plant site have the same feeling and spirit about the importance of plant turnaround safety.
Communicate plant turnaround safety everyday during the turnaround period. You can increase the frequency if you get new findings while turnaround work is being done.