Run to failure... Can it be done while achieving process safety?

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Details: Written by Bryan Haywood; Parent Category: Safety Info Posts; Category: Chemical Process Safety (PSM/RMP); Published: 12 August 2013

In the past couple of months, I had several conversations with process safety professionals asking about "running equipment to failure" within a chemical process handling a highly hazardous chemical (HHC) or extremely hazardous substance (EHS). These discussions were often lively and I was actually called "a consultant" "that needed to walk a mile in my shoes"; as if I have I never fought this battle before whiling being a process safety professional in the petrochemical industry for 15 years. This is not a new battle in the process safety arena and I imagine it may never end until everyone is fundamentally on the same page with how a process should be managed. But as I sit here on my plane riding across this great nation and the memory of the recent plane crash in San Francisco, "run to failure" is CRYSTAL CLEAR right now. Here is how I see things, flying 500 mph at 36,000 ft...

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#2 Bryan 2013-08-19 20:52

Sure BS I will give it a try. My general rule is that we start with ALL the piping used to contain our HHC/EHS is a class 1. There are some situations where we may be able to lessen the inspection burdens and class the pipe to some lesser level. For example, I have had flammable liquid lines be classed as something less than Class 1. This was a 0.25" line with a flammable liquid that has a FP very close to 100F. This flammable liquid is also chilled to maintain its temp at around 65F and it was located outdoors in a HAZLOC. An analysis (including the PHA) showed that a failure of the pipe would NOT create a catastrophic incident. Just to show the other side... The same process ja coolin water lines classed higher than these flammable liquid lines. So just because the pipe contains the HHC/EHS may not automatically make it a Class 1 circuit. Hope this helps. Done on my cell phone so please forgive type-o's

#1 BS 2013-08-19 20:37

Could you please explain what you mean by "most" of the piping in contact with our HHC/EHS will be a Class 1? Is there a good rule of thumb in going about classifying your piping if the materials you are trying to classify are not close to the examples given in API 570? Thanks

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