Liquefied petroleum gas plant maintenance: a case study of gangway failure analysis

摘要

Complex equipment fails from time to time, subsequently leading to losses in production output and hence the requirement for repair and replacement of components. In order to reduce the number of frequent failures, periodic inspection of equipment can be conducted to identify and rectify any minor defect that may otherwise cause a failure to occur. This paper investigates several failures on a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) gangway in a liquefied natural gas (LNG) processing plant. The plant was observed during operation and weekly inspection of the gangway was conducted prior to ship loading to meet marine operation and maintenance requirements. During operation of the facility, a number of issues relating to the reliability and safety of operating the LPG gangway were identified. An evaluation of all safety, operability and maintainability issues associated with the LPG gangway was conducted. Some of the identified incidents involved the gangway impacting ships and causing damage to both the gangway and the ships. A root cause analysis (RCA) approach was used to analyse historical failure and maintenance data. Reliability and downtime analysis was conducted in order to determine the failure pattern of the gangway system. A reliability model is proposed in an attempt to evaluate improvement and deterioration in order to ensure the safe and reliable operation of the LPG gangway.