Contribution of CM and NDE to asset management

摘要

In recent decades, enormous efforts have been focused on increasing the capability of engineering systems, leading to their increasingly intensive utilisation. Assets that are of both high value and high risk, such as power and process plants, offshore platforms and bridges, are ageing but there is a significant need for their further Use. Ageing leads to the gradual reduction of safety margins of structures and components. At the same time, our understanding of safety has been changing. The extent to which our society accepts risk is decreasing and this forces regulators to render the safety regulations progressively more serious. Both condition monitoring (CM) and non-destructive evaluation (NDE) deliver an essential input to integrity analysis and thus play an important role in assessing the safety and availability of structures and components. In the first part of the paper, maintenance, surveillance, inspection and testing are described as elements of an integrated and coherent system of performance monitoring in which they contribute to ensure functional and structural integrity. Among other areas, developments in structural integrity analysis, fracture mechanics and the appearance of asset management as an independent discipline will be discussed, as well as the consideration of risk in a broader sense. In the second part of the paper, the major features of up-to-date/effective CM and NDE are presented. Also, the possiblity of CM and NDE merging in the future is suggested.