Incorporate Maintainability into

revamp and greenfield projects

Document Development Guidance

Department: Maintenance
Revision 1 – August 2018

Doc. No: AKH01-GUI-MTC-PHY-002

 Develop Reliability and Management strategy for fertilizer plants

Contents

1. Synopsis .............................................................................................................................................. 2
2. Why develop specific guidelines and procedures ......................................................................... 3
3. Purpose of this document ................................................................................................................. 3
4. Methodology ........................................................................................................................................ 3
5. Review Process .................................................................................................................................. 3
6. Design Features for Maintenance.................................................................................................... 5
7. Further information ............................................................................................................................. 5
8. Responsibility ...................................................................................................................................... 5
9. Develop your own organization procedures ................................................................................... 5
10. Definitions ........................................................................................................................................ 6

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1. SYNOPSIS
AmmoniaKnowHow.com and UreaKnowHow.com support fertilizer manufacturers by providing essential
services to the industry, using our syngas technologies and scientific knowledge developed in multiple
projects worldwide.

Together we initiate a program to enhance the guidelines and procedures for operation, engineering,
maintenance and process safety in the fertilizer industry utilizing the best practices and standards
available today.

Using knowledge gained from our industry, historic risk registers, lessons learned from projects and from
FIORDA members we are committed to give proper advice to improve safety, reliability and projects
performance of fertilizer plants.

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2. WHY DEVELOP SPECIFIC GUIDELINES AND PROCEDURES

Guidelines and Procedures are developed to help staff and management teams run the organization. In
the best use situations, procedures play a strategic role in an organization. They are developed in light of
the mission and objectives of the company and they become the media by which management’s plans,
rules, intents, and business and operation processes become documented and communicated to all staff.

Carefully drafted and standardized guidelines and procedures save the company countless hours of
management time. Guidelines, procedures and employee handbook should be an important part of the
operation. They should be the first thing given to a new employee (either in hard copy or an electronic
version). They should also be easily accessible in their most up-to-date version. Hence it is extremely
important that an organization’s procedures are a “living document” prepared and saved in Microsoft
Word and easily exported into portable versions (like PDF) and made available over the company
network.

3. PURPOSE OF THIS DOCUMENT

The purpose of this document is to provide guidance to Projects and Operation departments to support the
delivery of revamp projects, TAR activities and greenfield projects by incorporate maintainability into design
since early stages.

This document aims to verify maintainability considerations are taken into account during the selection of
equipment and the design of facilities.

Maintainability assesses the ease of conducting maintenance activities on specific equipment or facilities.
It considers the practicality of executing maintenance tasks, potential hazards to which individuals are
exposed and whether the equipment, the design, the facilities and the layout will enable efficient and
effective maintenance

4. METHODOLOGY
The purpose of a Maintainability Review process is to verify that operations and maintenance experience
is captured and incorporated into the design of new facilities, including modifications to an existing plant.
Similar with a 3D review model a Maintainability Review is a formal review process in which specialized
maintenance expertise is used to verify that the quality and reliability from a maintenance perspective is
provided in project design. The formal Maintainability Review is in addition to the ongoing input by
Operations personnel to reviews of design and equipment selection during the design stages (e.g. HAZID,
HAZOP, LOPA, SIMOPS, Design review studies etc.).

The objective is to confirm that the design enables the effective maintenance of equipment and eradicates
any features which could:

• Create unsafe conditions.

• Cause loss of production.
• Result in high maintenance and repair cost.
• Cause inefficient work activity

5. REVIEW PROCESS
Similar with a Human Factor analysis a Maintainability Review is principally directed at human / process
and human/equipment interfaces, with the following objectives:

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• Identify elements of design that could create unsafe conditions during maintenance.
• Identify elements of design that could result in the inefficient and/or unreliable maintenance of
the facility.
• Recommend actions to modify the design.

Review stages
The Maintainability Review Process comprises the following five stages:

• Define review scope and Terms of Reference.

• Select review team members and collate information to support review execution.
• Conduct review prioritize findings and develop recommendations.
• Agree and designate required actions.
• Monitor and verify action plan implementation.

Maintainability Reviews should be phased across the design stages of the project. The number and
timing of the reviews shall depend on the scale and duration of the project, but typically comprises:

• Preliminary review during Select.

• Intermediate review during Define, at 50% of Detailed Design.
• Final review at 90% of Detailed Design.
• Dropped object/swinging load review at 30% completion.

Review duration
There are no precise rules for the duration of the Maintainability Reviews. It depends on a number of
factors, such as:

• Review type (i.e. preliminary, intermediate or final).

• Review scope (i.e., entire facility/project, selected area, system, equipment package etc.).
• Review team size and experience levels.

As a benchmark, the review of an entire facility/project should be expected to take not less than two
weeks. The review of a selected equipment package will typically require one-half to one full working day.

Review team
The size and composition of a Maintainability Review team should reflect the type and scope of the
subject review and the diversity and complexity of equipment to be considered. An optimum team size for
any review is 6-8 persons. This number allows for adequate flexibility and breadth of experience and
allows team meetings to be effective and manageable.

An example review team comprises the following members:

• Chairman (Facilitator)
• Project Engineer
• Relevant Discipline Engineer(s)
• Design representative
• Operations Team members, with experience of the maintenance of facilities similar to that
being reviewed.
• Secretary / Clerk
A Maintainability Review Log shall be used to document each review comment. Upon completion, the
review team forwards the log to the Project Engineer, who reviews the comments and, when necessary,
discusses the comments with the reviewers to verify validity. The Project Engineer responds to each
comment, either accepting or rejecting, and forwards the log to the designers for action.

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Input data
• Physical configuration and layout drawings.
• Design philosophies
• Design specifications
• Test data
• Results of any FMEA studies
• Results of any maintainability predictions
If available, 3-D CAD imaging tools should be used to improve design visualization. Reviewing a project
or package from 2-D drawings is often tedious and time consuming and requires experience. The use of
3-D imaging removes much of the drudgery from the review and greatly improves the quality of responses
from O&M staff. They can “see” and “walk” the facility in a virtual sense before anything is constructed.

Review finding categorization/prioritization

The Maintainability Review findings should be categorized to reflect their relative importance and priority
for corrective action.

Each action should be closed based on specific action close-out procedure.

6. DESIGN FE ATURES FOR MAINTENANCE

The Maintainability design features are categorized as follows:

• General - features which apply to all equipment.

• Minimize Maintenance – provision of facilities to reduce the level of required maintenance.
• Access – features to enable ready access to equipment for maintenance.
• Layout - equipment layout considerations.
• Isolation – provision of isolation facilities to verify safe working on the plant and reduce loss of
production.
• Condition Monitoring – requirements to verify condition monitoring can be implemented on
various equipment types.
• Mechanical Handling – lifting, handling and transportation considerations.
• Maintenance Facilities – required workshop.
• Obsolescence – selection of equipment that is not at risk of premature obsolescence

7. FURTHER INFORMATION
[A complete guideline can be developed specifically for clients in the fertilizer industry by
www.AmmoniaKnowHow.com]

8. RESPONSIBILITY
Reliability and Management strategy is a document owned by the Maintenance department within the
organization. They are responsible to develop the guidelines and philosophy for Projects and Facilities to
support the delivery of company maintenance strategy.

9. DEVELOP YOUR OWN ORG ANIZATION PROCEDURES

Although templates can give you a head start on procedures development, other factors must be
considered as you write your own internal documents.

One factor is your organization’s culture. Organizational attitudes toward procedures determine the
spectrum. On one end of the scale are companies that have a procedure for everything. At the other end
of the spectrum are companies that only have only a few guidelines (only those required by the laws that

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are relevant to that company). Most companies fall somewhere in between these two extremes. The
manager writing any guideline needs to understand where on the spectrum the company it falls and how
the policy can be made to fit the organization’s culture to enhance compliance.

Other two factors to be consider when developing guidelines and procedures are the fertilizer technology
that company employs and local and international standards applicable to the industry. Internal standards
and procedures must be developed in line with these factors, being applicable for your own plants and in
line with regulatory requirements.

The last, but not least, factor when developing your own procedures is the best industry practice that you
need to employ. Liaison with your fertilizer association, participation in industry meetings and conferences
and using fertilizer industry consultants can bring a fresh eye, new ideas and enhance the quality of your
own guidelines and procedures.

10. DEFINITIONS

FIORDA Fertilizer Industry Operational Risks Database

R&M Reliability & Maintenance

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Disclaimer

The information contained in this document is given in good faith and while every care has been taken in preparing these documents,
UreaKnowHow.com and AmmoniaKnowHow.com make no representations and give no warranties of whatever nature in respect of these documents,
including but not limited to the accuracy or completeness of any information, facts and/or opinions contained therein. Both companies, its subsidiaries,
the directors, employees and agents cannot be held liable for the use of and reliance of the opinions, estimates, forecasts and findings in these
documents.

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Fertilizer Industrial Services Ltd
Venture House, Arlington Square
Downshire Way, Bracknell, RG12 1WA, UK
P: + 44 (0) 7494 783 534
Web: www.fertilizer.services
E-mail: dan.cojocaru@fertilizer.services