Preparation of Equipment for Maintenance

Preparation of Equipment for Maintenance The essential feature of this procedure is a permit-to-work system The operating team members prepare the equipment and write down on the permit the work to be done, the preparation carried out, the remaining hazards, and the precautions necessary. The permit is then accepted by the person or group who will carry out the work and is returned when the work is complete. The permit system will not make maintenance 100 percent safe, but it reduces the chance that hazards will be overlooked, lists ways of controlling them, and informs those doing the job what precautions they should take. The... 

Maintenance is a major source of accidents, not so much the maintenance in itself but the preparation of equipment for maintenance. Sometimes the procedures are inadequate sometimes the procedures are satisfactory but not followed. In particular ... 

Good initial design of pipework and vessels facilitates preparation of equipment for maintenance and repair. The positioning of flanges so that blanks can be inserted in pipelines and the provision of drain cocks or plugs at low points are typical of items to be considered at the design stage. 

Non-routine procedure such as equipment clean-outs and preparation of equipment for maintenance Auxiliary equipment operations inciuding as examples LEV and Ventilation Systems, Heat/Cool Skids, Water (Soft, RO, WFI, Tower, etc.) Systems, Instrument and Process Air Systems, Waste Treatment Systems, Cooling (Glycol Refrigeration) Systems, Steam Generation, and others Safety and operational issues Change control procedures ... 

Has potential for external pressure (vacuum) from sudden cooling, condensing, pump-out, during clean-up or preparation of equipment for maintenance, or potentially subrnerged overflow line been addressed ... 

Are provisions made for safe handling of flammable or potentially explosive materials Consider materials of construction, cleanup and preparation of equipment for maintenance. 

Will adequate design provisions exist for cleanup and preparation of equipment for maintenance of equipment/piping/control systems (including lockout of all energy sources and double isolation where required) ... 

This chapter describes some accidents that occurred because operating procedures were poor. It does not include accidents that occurred because of defects in procedures for preparing equipment for maintenance or vessels for entry. These are discussed in Chapters 1 and 11. 

The incidents described could occur in many different types of plants and are therefore of widespread interest. Some of them illustrate the hazards involved in activities such as preparing equipment for maintenance and modifying plants. Others illustrate the hazards associated with widely used equipment, such as storage tanks and hoses, and with that universal component of all plants and processes people. Other incidents illustrate the need for techniques, such as hazard and operability studies, and protective devices, such as emergency isolation valves. 

Equipment failures and human errors together caused one third of the events. Although precautions (as a matter of quality assurance) can be taken in this respect (selection of equipment, preventive maintenance, training, preparation for works, etc.), these two types of events are nevertheless difficult to avert totally. 

The interim examination and maintenance cell is a shielded hot-cell complex that conducts nondestructive examinations of test assemblies and core components under controlled argon-atmosphere conditions. (Its location is shown in Fig. A.l). The hot cell can also be used to perform limited maintenance of plant equipment or to prepare plant equipment for transfer to other maintenance facilities. The cell contains equipment necessary for disassembly, reassembly, and requalification of test assemblies and components. Nondestructive examinations that can be performed include dimensional checks, weighing, gamma scanning, visual inspections, and photography. Sodium removal facilities are also included. 

This chapter is about the design, quality and application of equipment for the preparation of medicines in a pharmacy or for preparation in small scale pharmaceutical industry. The type of pharmaceutical equipment needed depends on the type of products to be produced, on the required productive capacity and the batch size. A list of essential and critical equipment for production and quality control must be included as attachment in the URS (User Requirements Specification) of any facility. In this chapter only equipment commonly used for preparation in pharmacies and small scale industry is discussed. The equipment, requirements, qualification methods, main applications, maintenance and cleaning procedures are described for ... 

Existing maintenance procedures must be reviewed for several reasons. Typically, these are established based upon manufacturers recommended practices for stock equipment such as pumps, centrifuges and some reactors. However, a new toll can introduce special cleaning and preparation steps as well as possible material of construction incompatibilities. If the toller is using new equipment, special maintenance practices and tools may also be required. 

Tile standard requires tlie preparer to describe tlie precautions for safe handling and use. Tliese include recommended industrial hygiene practices, precautions to be taken during repair and maintenance of equipment, and procedures for cleaning up spills and leaks. Some manufacturers also use Uiis section to include useful itiformation not specifically required by the standard, such as EPA waste disposal tnethods and state atid local requiretnents. 

As planned maintenance encompasses all types covered within the preventive or scheduled systems, this can be examined in more detail. In preparing a planned maintenance system, all the available sources of information should be used. These include manufacturers and suppliers literature, trade associations, professional institutions, knowledge and experience from within the department and history and feedback from previous work for the specific type of equipment. 

Key Performance Indicators Preparation for maintenance, the control of modifications, and the testing of protective equipment are examples of key performance indicators i.e., taken together, they indicate uie quality of the plant s and company s process safety. If they are below standard, the plant is at risk. The usual measure of safety, the lost-time accident (LTA) rate, does not measure process safety. Many companies that had a low LTA rate and assumed that their process safety was therefore under control have experienced serious fires and explosions. 

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