Industrial rope access enables record shutdown time for Malaysian refinery
21/08/2009
One major benefit of industrial rope access is the minimisation of shutdown time of industrial assets. With industrial rope access, scaffolding, cradles or mobile elevated work platforms are no longer necessary to be able to access high or remote locations. Compared to traditional approaches, inspection and testing can be performed faster, resulting in cost savings for clients.Time is money. Shutdown time is more money. However, production facilities, refineries, petrochemical and power plants must be regularly closed down or taken out of service to make way for scheduled maintenance operations. To be able to minimise the duration of the shutdown and allow operations to resume more quickly would be a laudable accomplishment.
The leading integrated palm oil player in Malaysia usually schedules eight days of downtime for inspecting their splitter towers, which will be accessed by means of traditional scaffolding. However, no more than four days were available for the current assessment of the Splitter Tower 1. Having no experience with industrial rope access, the company was interested in knowing the capabilities and limitations of the method.
Industrial rope access is a form of work positioning developed from techniques used in caving. It is an internationally-recognised alternative to traditional means of access such as scaffoldings, ladders, gondolas, boson chairs, mechanical lifts and staging. With industrial rope access, a worker uses two ropes – a working rope and a back-up, safety rope – and is permanently attached to both to prevent falls.
SGS carried out a pre-job site visit, free of charge. All necessary IRATA documentation including task-specific risk assessments, method statements and rescue plan were submitted in advance. To perform the dye penetrant examination of all welded T-joints inside their splitter tower, a two-man SGS-IRATA certified NDT team was mobilised from Singapore.
It took only two days to set up, carry out inspection, de-rig the ropes and prepare the inspection report – a record downtime for the refinery.
www.sgs.com/industrial
