All Turnaround Jobs Are Not Equal! Managing Process Safety during Major Turnarounds at World Scale Ammonia Facility

The Occupational Safety risks associated with Plant Turnarounds are well known and managed by Operators and Contractors in the Petrochemical Sector. However, Plant Turnarounds at petrochemical plants present a unique process safety challenge that must be intentionally managed and is an area where arguably not enough focus is placed, despite the high consequence potential of process safety incidents.

With maintenance and operations activities being done during transient operations (e.g. plant shutdown and startup), coupled with maintenance jobs interfacing with live process systems during the TAR, as well as the influx of large groups of Contractors to execute these jobs there is heightened process safety risk that must be identified, understood and controlled to ensure successful outcomes.

This paper will detail the management principles and systems that are employed during major Turnarounds at a world-scale ammonia facility to identify, understand and control process hazards to protect employees, facility assets and the environment. Details will also focus on how the Process Safety interface between the Plant Operator and the executing Contractor is managed to ensure the large, transient, temporary Contractor workforce fully understand their roles, requirements and responsibilities regarding Process Safety.

Apart from the usual dimensions of process safety management such as Management of Change (MOC) and Pre-startup Safety Review (PSSR) etc. the paper will also outline proactive philosophies implemented by the Operator to spot and prevent process safety incidents and capture opportunities to stay ahead of inherent Turnaround process safety threats.