Equipment Reliability Focused Operating Envelopes

摘要

A concept for Operating Envelopes started at BP's Whiting Refinery around 2001. The focus for this program was to establish minimum and/or maximum limits in order to meet long-term availability and reliability targets. Short-term or immediate safety, environmental, and product quality limits are managed using DCS alarms, so the Operating Envelope program was developed to provide a means of tracking these reliability limits without overloading the board operators with another layer of alarms. Operating Envelopes are "soft" limits intended to provide early indications that a piece of equipment is being operated in a manner that begins to adversely impact the life of the equipment. The value of Operating Envelopes is to assist in making sound operating decisions based on equipment life cycle costs by monitoring the equipment operating parameters, documenting the basis for the limits, and making informed decisions based on the impact of the equipment life versus short-term operating benefit when exceeding the limits. BP's Whiting Refinery has a well-defined work process for managing Operating Envelopes that has been fully implemented since 2005. The work process includes roles and responsibilities for the various levels of operations, engineers, and management and includes a three level review and escalation process to ensure the limits are being successfully managed and reviewed without causing any significant time commitments from any single group.