Plant Management
Operations monitoring
Chris Stearns describes the implementation of effective operations monitoring solutions for process industry facilities.
Chris Stearns beschreibt die Umsetzung von effektiven Betriebsüberwachungs- lösungen für
verfahrenstechnische Anlagen.
Chris Stearns décrit la mise en place des solutions efficaces en matière de suivi des opérations pour les installations de traitement industrielles.
M
any automated industrial plants have now implemented some type of operations monitoring programme.
However, the effectiveness of these programmes – the next logical step after alarm management – can be limited by the use of ad-hoc or standalone tools such as spreadsheet applications to evaluate process variables against operating limits, conduct plant data analysis and perform stewardship reporting.
Operational challenges For process plant owners, it is important to support control engineers, optimisation engineers and operators who are implementing best practices for operational excellence aimed at meeting the plant’s business and safety goals. Personnel must monitor a wide range
of measurements and key performance indicators (KPIs) from plant and equipment at a production site, as well as maintain the required values of variables to meet operating objectives such as maximum yield, utmost efficiency and minimum emissions. An operating envelope is a collection
Plant owners and operators now face continual pressure to optimise all their facilities and processes. Greater productivity must be achieved more efficiently with fewer resources.
of constraints, boundaries and operating limits in an industrial facility that, when exceeded, put the integrity of assets at risk. These limits are typically based on combinations of factors such as process unit capacity, equipment constraints and safety concerns. They can also be implemented for alarm systems and operating targets. According to the Abnormal Situation Management (ASM) Consortium, ensuring operations remain within correct limits is central to avoiding many of the root causes of abnormal situations. To maximise the life of an asset in an industrial facility, it must be operated according to design parameters and not simply within process safety limits. That means extending operating strategies beyond operator visibility to
the entire operations team and all those interacting with the process. Without a comprehensive limit management solution, operators lack the insight needed to run plants within operating envelope boundaries. Industrial sites typically employ
multiple types of process control applications, each of which can be used to independently enter and control respective targets, constraints or limits. Although these applications may relate to the same process measurements, the limits they use are sometimes inconsistent or conflicting. This situation can result in inefficient operation, costly process upsets and unplanned shutdowns. Various groups within the plant
are responsible for maintaining safe operating limit information. As these variables are often system configuration parameters entered by humans, there is the possibility values may fall outside of the safety and compliance envelope. Additionally, some processes have dynamic safe operating limits that are continually changing, which is challenging for plant operators to manage. As these limits are adjusted for safety, reliability and optimisation reasons, staff across the facility must have current and updated exceedance reporting to effectively manage site performance. Plant owners and operators are
under continual pressure to optimise their facilities and processes. This means achieving greater productivity more efficiently with fewer resources. Data about plant performance is key to making smart operational decisions, but in most cases, operators have access only to piecemeal information about their units and processes – examining performance often in a vacuum.
Alarm rationalisation Process industry facilities typically devote considerable resources to rationalising their alarm systems so operators can effectively manage the process and not
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