7 days, 7 blogs - Don’t sit and wait to embark on your journey to the digital promised land

Decide when the upgrade should be performed

When it comes to legacy safety systems, the adage of “if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it” is putting many operating companies’ businesses at unnecessary risk. But in today’s period of tight budgets and limited resources, it is very challenging to get the funding to upgrade legacy safety systems—especially if that system is perceived to still be working fine.

Another factor in the justification process is identifying the proper timing to undertake the upgrade. This should take into consideration reliability, total cost of ownership, system performance, availability of spares and expertise, access to the equipment, production needs, downtime, prioritization with other projects, company directives, standards compliance, cyber security, support costs etc. This is not an exact science, however, whenever an element is out of balance, it can signal that it is time to evaluate if an upgrade is necessary.

Get active, don’t sit and wait until it’s too late

It is important that the decision to upgrade your safety system is an educated one based on the full understanding of the financial impact, ROI, benefits, risks and potential consequences.  In simple terms there are only 2 choices to make:

1.     Sit and wait until something happens, then deal with it ‘As and When’

2.     Be proactive and develop a plan (the preferred option for high performing, tier 1 operating companies)

Many companies seem content to ‘sit and wait’ and are hesitant to upgrade until a specific issue forces them to act - by which time it may be too late. From my experience, top quartile operating companies with a low risk tolerance focused on business continuity adopt a proactive approach and don’t wait for a failure to occur. They establish the current “As-is” state and undertake detailed life cycle workshops to determine the actual status and life cycle of the existing equipment. They then set the target where (and when) they want to be, what the gaps are then put a comprehensive plan together. A good practice is to continually evaluate the long-term viability of their safety systems.  

Start early and get a head start

There is a popular adage often attributed to Benjamin Franklin, the father of time management, “failing to plan is planning to fail”. Those high performing operating companies who take a proactive approach typically start early to plan and refine upgrade projects over multiple years. This can start as early as 3 years before the actual planned / scheduled turn around!

Often this starts with an initial investigation into the various options and choices, an outline of the approximate scope, and the budget estimates. This then facilitates discussions between the various stakeholders (read blog 2 – Win hearts and minds to build consensus) to narrow down the choices for further investigation or refinement. Once the way forward is agreed, then the scope, budget, resources and detailed planning can commence. Then the real work starts – as the detailed work packs are developed, and worked through ready for the shutdown when the upgrade can be implemented.  

When it comes to a safety system migration strategy, careful life cycle planning can reduce or eliminate risks. First and foremost, thoughtful consideration should be given to the scheduling of any migration. Long-term multi-year planning for multiple migration stages will help to ensure maximum ROI and minimal disruption. IF replacing the old system with new, then system cut-over requires careful planning to minimize risk.  A comprehensive cut-over plan is a critical requirement for seamless transition to a new safety system platform. Without proper preparation, migration projects can be affected by cut-over delays and other unexpected issues that may cause downtime.

When planning there are also many other factors that should be considered, including:

• The expected operating life of the plant
• Any future plant modifications (e.g. de-bottlenecking) or expansions (adding extra capacity)
• Proactive upgrade planning aligned to turnaround schedules
• Plant availability / access to equipment
• Re-HAZOP cycles
• New requirements e.g. cyber security, regulatory requirements, latest standards etc.
• Alignment with existing initiatives or improvement programs (lowers barriers to adoption)

Maturity indicators and status of existing equipment

Effective life cycle management and planning requires detailed analysis the current state environment and the future characteristics to ensure all inter-dependencies and support requirements are identified and appropriate actions defined. Another useful indicator when planning the upgrade is to look at the expected life of the various safety system components, and understand the various inter-dependencies e.g. upgrading to the most current I/O module may require a firmware upgrade to the main processor, or even an upgrade to latest main processor.  

A good way of recording the status of the system components is to conduct regular life cycle status. These detailed reviews should detail the individual system, subsystem and modules (i.e. make, model, serial number, hardware revision, firmware revision etc.). All parts should be assessed using the customers published life cycle data to determine the current status and future phases and duration. This allows the stakeholders to determine the current status and identify priorities.  E.g. Is the part still in production? Is it supportable? When is the last buy date? Such a review allows you to build a life cycle status of the system well into the future.

A simple “traffic light” structure helps visually identify issues, areas of focus and priority. This information helps support a balanced decision on whether a full or partial upgrade is required and compare this to other major factors e.g. the operating life of the asset. For example, in the simplified example below, it is obvious that there is a pressing urgency to upgrade the F&G1 system.

Tip: Ask your safety system vendor for a copy of their published life cycle policy and life cycle status for each element of the safety system (every reputable safety system vendor should have one)

Keep up with the speed of change

As soon as you write a plan, it can almost be out of date, such is the pace of technology. Due to the various lifespans of system components, effective life cycle management is an important process to maintain. When developing the plan, it is worth investigating the lifespan of the various parts of the safety systems as these are likely to be different, with some becoming obsolete faster than others. So not only is it important to upgrade to the latest versions, a plan needs to ‘protect the future’ and put plans in place to stay current and keep pace with the changing pace of technology.

Tip: Every company should have a safety system life cycle plan that is reviewed and updated at a regular frequency, which will help them understand the life cycle status, the potential risks to be managed and determine when the optimum time to upgrade is.

In the next blog we will take a closer look at applying a risk based approach to justifying safety system upgrades.