Shutdowns, turnarounds and outages are not easy. Months, if not years, are spent planning and scheduling thousands of work hours by hundreds of people.
Job steps, manpower requirements, mechanical component acquisition, scaffolding, equipment logistics, shutdown, decontamination, blinding, work execution, startup and many more comprise a symphony of events expected to play out in tune and on time.
A few decades ago, facilities utilized highly experienced personnel to coordinate and execute turnaround events and outages. Operations, mechanical, engineering and contractor staff worked together to pull off the most difficult tasks with ease. They knew how the systems worked and what to expect because they had executed dozens of projects in their careers.
But where are they now? Different departments? New organizations? Natural attrition? Experience has left the building, and with it, all facets of event teams are dealing with knowledge gaps.
Some of the experience was built on misses and failures. Some was learned from mentors and coaches. Little of that knowledge has been passed to the next generation. It’s a gap in the industry. If not managed correctly, the history of hard lessons will begin to repeat itself, leading to overlooked planning, shutdown/decontamination failures, sub-par equipment repairs and startup difficulties.
RTI is focused on delivering shutdown support services to clients across North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific through predictability, innovation and expertise.
Refined Technologies (RTI) recognized the gap and developed processes and tools to help close them. Whether it’s shutdown, startup and turnaround consulting or industry leading decontamination services, RTI utilizes data from thousands of projects over the past 20+ years. It adds hundreds of years of cumulative operations and mechanical knowledge to partner with event teams so they can start a project on track and keep it that way.
One function that sets the stage for the entire turnaround is the decontamination phase. Issues that arise during this phase have the potential to cause delays and generate additional unplanned work hours.
RTI understands that shutdown and decontamination are critical to all events; it has developed a tool that incorporates years of experience into a work process that captures and communicates every aspect of them.
RTI, along with its client operations and mechanical teams, are using iView, an innovative app that can be accessed via the web by desktop users or any Apple or Android device. The app is designed to:
- Utilize industry best practices to guide the planning and execution phases
- Prompt the user to gather specific field data for isolations, injection points, drains, vents, rinse locations and specific tasks that are required to execute the plan
- Automatically generate required documentation for the project, such as detailed mechanical needs with images, effluent summary and bill of materials
- Standardize spools and adapters to provide low-cost solutions for all connection points
- Customize spools and adapters as needed to meet client requirements
- Equip turnaround teams with tie-point data that is easy to locate in the field
- Allow users to see planning and execution progress in real time iView is an industry game changer, one that helps close the experience gap with an innovative technology tool so the team can get back to executing turnarounds with excellence.
A global solutions provider, RTI is focused on delivering shutdown support services to clients across North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific through predictability, innovation and expertise. Its reputation for excellence is fueled by the belief that all work matters. With RTI, clients receive big-picture thinking with detailed technical execution to improve performance, lower the total cost and ensure one is ready for maintenance.
For more information, visit refinedtechnologies.com.
