Automation
Opportunities in
LDAR
(and the P&ID Data Conundrum)
Standards
Certification
Education & Training
Publishing
Conferences & Exhibits
Presenter
• Shane Kling is CEO and Co-Founder of Environmental
intellect (Ei) and has approximately 9 years of LDAR
compliance experience. During his career, he has
supported more than 100 facilities spanning petroleum
refining, chemicals, upstream oil and gas, and other
manufacturing industries. He recently transitioned from
Sage Environmental Consulting to support Ei’s mission
on a full-time basis, which is to improve industry
standards by introducing industry best available
technology and integrating existing data systems to
achieve the highest level of compliance.
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Audience Poll
What type of phone do you use?
or
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Topics to be Covered
– LDAR Compliance Processes and
Management Systems
– Description of Various LDAR Compliance
Processes
– P&IDs: The Compliance Foundation
– Automating Manual Compliance Processes
– Reducing Costs Associated With Manual
Processes
– Question and Answer
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Topics *Not* Covered
– Automating LDAR Monitoring Data Collection
– Bluetooth transmitters in combination with LDAR
databases is already industry best practice
– Automating LDAR Calibration Process
– LDAR Tools as already addressed this area with its
Cal3.0™ software and SpanBox3™
– LDAR Monitoring Robots, Puppies or Rainbows
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LDAR Automation Opportunities
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Why Automate Manual Processes?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Reduce opportunities for error
Eliminate inefficiencies and maximize labor force
Save costs by automating repetitive processes
Improve QA/QC between data systems
Create sustainable compliance processes
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Various LDAR Compliance Processes
• LDAR Applicability Determinations: (review
and highlighting of P&IDs to indicate LDAR /
non-LDAR)
• LDAR Inventory/Retag (transcribing P&IDs
markups through flagging, then tagging and
documentation)
• Management of Change (managing impacts
to LDAR program from engineering changes)
• Fugitive Emissions Estimating (heavy liquid
equipment counts)
• LDAR QA/QC (cross-referencing P&IDs vs.
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LDAR database to verify accuracy)
Common Link Within Compliance Processes
• What do all of these things have in common?
• LDAR Applicability Determinations
• LDAR Inventory/Retag
• Management of Change
• Fugitive Emissions Estimating
• LDAR QA/QC
1.They are all manually-intensive processes
2.They all involve Piping and Instrumentation
Diagrams (P&IDs)
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The Compliance Foundation
What in the world do P&IDs and foundations for
houses have in common?
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Data Within P&IDs
• The following data can be present in P&IDs:
• Equipment counts/inventory
• Equipment types
• Stream speciation
• Equipment design specifications
• Directional flow
• From/to information
• PI tag references
• Line lists, including piping IDs
• MOCs, redlines, and revision numbers
• Process unit, drawing number, and facility name
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Anatomy Of P&ID:
Data, Data, Data
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The P&ID Data Conundrum
• Industry standard CAD programs were not designed to
meet the needs of compliance programs
– Purpose was to provide an "electronic drawing board" to
draftspersons
• In fact, the first commercial version of AutoCAD was
released in 1982:
– Shortly after the promulgation of NSPS VV (1981) but before
NSPS GGG (1983)
– 10 YEARS prior to the promulgation of the Process Safety
Management standards in 1992, which requires P&ID updates
every 5 years as part of PHA revalidation
– 32 YEARS prior to promulgation of NSPS GGGa and VVa
(2008)
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Best Opportunity to Automate?
Sure, “automation” sounds like a nice concept,
but…
…how do we justify the costs?
•The answer for most plants: capital projects,
turnarounds, or LDAR inventory/retag projects
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LDAR Inventory/Retag Projects
• Let’s now examine the various steps in a retag
project and explore opportunities for automation:
–
–
–
–
Applicability determinations and P&ID markup
Flagging
Tagging
Documentation
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Manual: LDAR Applicability Determinations
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Automated: LDAR Applicability Determinations
• Use “smart” P&IDs to automate process
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MANUAL: LDAR FLAGGING
Inefficient/TimeConsuming
Error-Prone (flagging -->
documenting)
Housekeeping Issues
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AUTOMATED: LDAR FLAGGING
Smart P&ID
Data
LeakDAS™ or
GuideWare™
Integration
• Engineering data is incorporated into smart P&ID™
• Single-click functionality to “push” inventory data into
GuideWare™ (directly) or LeakDAS™ database (indirectly)
• Saves on inventory/retag technician labor-hours
• More efficient data management/reduces potential for errors
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MANUAL: LDAR TAGGING
Tags, although not required
by LDAR regulations, are
commonly used together
with database identification
Tags are physically hung in
the field according to SOPs
Because tags are not
accounted for in database,
tracking tag inventory is
difficult
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(SEMI)AUTOMATED: LDAR TAGGING
• Physical hanging of tags is unchanged; however you can:
• Track that all tags hung for valves, pumps, and other tagged
equipment match LDAR applicability in smart P&ID
• Audit LDAR database and smart P&ID to identify tagging gaps
• Incorporate LDAR tag numbers into P&IDs for future MOC tracking
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MANUAL: LDAR DOCUMENTATION
Manually-intensive and
onerous
Error-prone: relies on LDAR
inventory technicians to
capture tens or hundreds of
thousands of data records
Mass-editing of data
accomplished through
LDAR database manually
QA/QC limited to manual
review (field and database) not verifiable directly with
P&IDs
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AUTOMATED: LDAR DOCUMENTATION
• Equipment, Stream,
Service, Drawing No. etc.
is stored in sP&ID™
• Data is exported from
sP&IDs™ into
GuideWare™ or
LeakDAS™
Increased
Efficiency!
sP&ID ™ Pre-Population
of LDAR Database
Manual Data-Entry
• Data is pre-populated into
handhelds for technicians
to field-verify
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Documentation
Workflow
Smart P&ID
LDAR
Speciation
Document in
Tablet
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Example LDAR MOC Workflow
Automated LDAR MOC Workflow
HA-135
Technician with “smart P&ID” loaded on tablet
MOC Data Shared
Amongst Plant
Disciplines
Component identified
and updated in tablet
Smart P&ID indicating MOC changes (pink cloud)
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Automated LDAR MOC Tools
HA-135
NAPHTHA FEED PUMP 1A
4FWA-1A
LUBE OIL PUMP
DISCHARGE
269-1
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Novel Approach to Identify
When MOCs are Put into Service
PI tag near newly-added component
may indicate if equipment is in
hydrocarbon service
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Manual: Leak Repair Scheduling
• Question: When a leak is identified, how is the
repair scheduled, tracked, and ultimately logged
into database for compliance records?
– Answer: The LDAR Coordinator or Database Admin
generates Leak Repair Work Order, and this is distributed
to Maintenance
• Maintenance then logs the repair into its
maintenance management system (e.g., SAP)
• Closure of leak relies on a lot of communication,
manual processes, and data “silos”
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Automated: Repair Scheduling
and Data Exchange
Maintenance work
orders within smart
P&ID
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Automated: Repair Scheduling
and Data Exchange (cont.)
• Integrating LDAR databases, such as
GuideWare™ or LeakDAS™ with SAP or Maximo
offers: compliance improvements, reduced labor,
and seamless communication
• Some companies have integrated their LDAR
database with SAP, but there are others with
limited I.T. resources that have this need
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Costs Associated with P&IDs
• Many operating facilities spend millions of dollars
each year in activities that directly/indirectly
involve P&IDs:
– Engineering/CAD
– MOC Updates and Redlines, Troubleshooting
– CAD Updates
– Safety
– PHA Revalidation
– Process Safety Information (PSI) Updates
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Costs Associated with P&IDs (cont.)
– Operations and Maintenance
– Identification of equipment
– Environmental
– Applicability determinations
– P&ID-based compliance reviews (e.g., LDAR, BWON, NSPS Ja)
– MOC updates
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LDAR Compliance Costs
• There are several LDAR-related costs that can
be reduced with automation, including but not
limited to:
• LDAR Applicability Determinations
• LDAR Inventory/Retag
• Management of Change
• LDAR QA/QC
• Fugitive Emissions Estimating
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Return on Investment:
LDAR Applicability Determinations / P&ID Markups
No. of P&IDs
1000
Frequency
Every 5 Years
Labor Category
Bill Rate
Time w/o (hrs)
Cost w/o
Engineer
$100/hr
1
$100
- 1 P&ID per hour to markup by
Efficiency Gain
Time w/
Cost w/
hand, speciate, and scan into PDF
90%
0.1
$10
Net Savings
$90
Total Savings
$90,000
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Return on Investment:
LDAR Inventory/Retag
Task
No. of P&IDs
No. of Components
Labor Category
Flagging Technician
- Flag 4 P&IDs per Day
Tagging Technician
- Hang 250 Tags per Day
Documenting Technician
- Document 250 Comps per Day
LDAR Inventory/Retag
1,000
50,000
Bill Rate
$50/hr
Efficiency Gain
50%
Bill Rate
$30/hr
Efficiency Gain
0%
Bill Rate
$40/hr
Efficiency Gain
50%
Time w/o (hrs)
2500
Time w/
1250
Time w/o (hrs)
2000
Time w/
2000
Time w/o (hrs)
2000
Time w/
1000
Total Savings
Cost w/o
$125,000
Cost w/o
$62,500
Cost w/o
$60,000
Cost w/
$60,000
Cost w/o
$80,000
Cost w/
$40,000
$102,500
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Return on Investment: LDAR MOC
Task
MOC LDAR Updates
No. of MOCs/Year
500
Frequency
Daily
Labor Category
Bill Rate
Time w/o (hrs)
Cost w/o
MOC Technician
$45/hr
4
$180
- 4 hours per P&ID
Efficiency Gain
Time w/
Cost w/
to inventory and monitor
33%
3
$135
Net Savings
$45
Total Annual Savings
$30,000
5-Year Return
$150,000
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Concluding Thoughts
1. Shift from Analog to Digital: The need exists to begin
process of converting your facility P&IDs into "smart P&IDs"
that can fulfill the company's needs.
2. Technology Integration Reduces Operational Costs:
Automating repetitive processes allows professionals to
focus on solving problems computers cannot
3. Management Buy-in: There are several opportunities to
gain Management buy-in, such as capital projects, P&ID
revalidation, LDAR inventory/retag, etc.
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Concluding Thoughts (cont.)
4. Leading the Effort: As professionals, your knowledge is
more valuable to the company than repetitive job tasks
5. Ask Questions, Learn More: The information presented
today should provide a good introductory conversation with
CAD, engineering and your Management on opportunities
for automation.
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Questions?
Fugitive
Emissions
Estimating
LDAR
Inventory/
Retag
Management
of Change
LDAR
Applicability
Comp
liance
Data
LDAR
QA/QC
Don’t Let These Compliance Processes
Continue to Chase You
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