(87b) Will It Really Make That Much of a Difference? Broad Effects of Operational Changes on Relief System Design

Will It Really Make that Much of a Difference?

Broad Effects of Operational Changes on Relief System Design

Ms.
Marie Baker
Cognascents
Consulting Group, Inc.
908
Town & Country Blvd., Suite 500
Houston,
TX 77024

marie.baker@cognascents.com

Mr.
Teddy Bucher
Cognascents
Consulting Group, Inc.
908
Town & Country Blvd., Suite 500
Houston,
TX 77024

teddy.bucher@cognascents.com

Keywords: Evergreen,
flare system analysis, Hazard and Operability study (HAZOP), Independent
Protection Layer (IPL), Management of Change (MOC), overpressure analysis, pressure
relief analysis and design, Process Hazard Analysis (PHA), process modes of
operation, Process Safety Information (PSI), relief device design basis, relief
rate calculation and sizing, safeguard.

Abstract

Throughout the life of an operating facility, changes to the
process are inevitable and potentially affect the systems that keep personnel
and equipment safe. The Management of Change (MOC) process is intended to
evaluate proposed changes prior to implementation to assess and address any
risks that might be introduced as a result of this change. The MOC process
typically includes a process hazards analysis (e.g. Hazard and Operability
study, Layer of Protection Analysis), which evaluates safeguards and
independent protection layers (IPLs) for the proposed changes.

Of the many IPLs, pressure relief devices are often
overlooked and a re-evaluation of the design basis is sometimes not performed. The
authors have observed that personnel do not always recognize the operational change
might have an effect on the relief system.

In this paper, the authors explore what types of changes
should trigger a relief system design review, exploring why what seem like
minor modifications can have much larger ramifications. They also provide
specific examples of the most common changes that demonstrate how the relief
system design can be affected.

The target audience for this paper is anyone whose
responsibilities include (1) pressure relief analysis, (2) process safety
management (3) management of an operating facility (4) process engineering (5) process
safety information management