Value of RAM Studies at Various FEL Stages of Capital Projects

Most Petrochemical, Utilities and Oil & Gas companies deploy a Phased Capital Project execution methodology with gated transitions from one phase into the next — Conceptual, Front-End Engineering & Design (FEED), Detailed Engineering, Procurement, Construction and Commissioning. The Front End Loading (FEL) process is a method where a high level of effort and expense is employed up-front in an early phase (i.e. FEED) to completely define the project scope and costs and implement various Value Improvement Practices (VIPs). This reduces the risk of project cost overruns, schedule changes and change orders in the later phases of the project.

Historically, little attention has been paid in the design phase to ensure that the equipment reliability and maintainability aspects were addressed. Only after the construction and commissioning phases of the project had commenced, some emphasis was placed on reviewing the reliability aspects of operations. Usually, it is too late and cost prohibitive then to make major changes to the design that impact reliability. However, Reliability Availability & Maintainability (RAM) studies performed in early stages (FEED phase) generate immense value to the project by:

• identifying potential bottlenecks (mechanical & process)
• estimating the on-stream availability
• outlining the planned and unplanned maintenance demands
• developing an optimum shutdown strategies (interval & duration)
• analyzing the impact of various maintenance staffing loads
• predicting the impact of equipment redundancy and sparing
• developing mitigation strategies for expected failure modes
• performing a preliminary equipment criticality analysis
• optimizing reliability at the design stages by analysis of a wide range of scenarios

This presentation will discuss the typical gaps encountered in capital project execution and illustrate applicable concepts for applying RAM studies in the FEED phase.

Key Words: Capital Project Execution, RAM Studies, Process Reliability Modeling, Risk Quantification, FEL RAM Validation

 

Kaizad P. Sunavala ABB NA Reliability Services