Safe Start-up of Ammonia / Urea Plants under Challenging Circumstances

摘要

Safety is always in the focus during start-up of a fertilizer complex. This includes occupational safety for the personnel working on site and process safety to ensure that the process does not generate any hazards. This paper gives examples of the tools used to ensure safety for the recent commissioning of two ammonia/urea complexes in 2013. This includes both organizational and technical activities during engineering, pre-commissioning, commissioning and start-up. It also highlights the importance of good collaboration with the end user and the specialist support from vendors such as Johnson Matthey and licensors. An unplanned situation occurred in one of the projects, when the first train of the complex had to be shut down after a few weeks of operation, because the production permit by the authorities was not available. The paper describes how these circumstances were handled and how the client was supported. The plant was out of operation for twelve months. Thanks to good preparation, the re-start went extremely smoothly, after a permit was available.