Many process facilities are engineered with a nominal design life, typically 15 to 25 years.
Laza Krstin, Senior Consultant, ABB Engineering ServicesHowever, there is increased business pressure to keep assets operating longer, whilst maintaining safety, environmental and integrity standards. In addition, operators seek to improve the asset’s reliability and availability. But how can they assure the continued use of ageing assets when maintenance budgets are already being squeezed?
The challenge facing operating companies is summarised in this typical quote from a reliability manager: “Our reliability improvement project has helped improve plant uptime. But that looks at historic equipment performance - the ‘bad actors’. How do we prevent the one-off ‘unforeseen’ equipment failures that can have catastrophic consequences?” Stakeholders (such as owners’ consortia) and regulators are increasingly looking for a formal review to justify the continued service of these assets.