PetroStreet

A resource.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... i=89978449

Thanks

I remember going through this 100 pages very valuable document helping me to identifying many cases applicable to my facilities.
Any update to this one after 2013?
If someone can check.

ivani1 wrote: 25 May 2025, 15:01 A resource.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... i=89978449

No doubt a wonderful resource. A lot many learnings from each of the listed cases.

Some of the indicators as per your shared report ivani1 are very useful:

"Notably, of the 137 major refinery accidents reported by EU countries to the EU’s
eMARS database since 1984, around 20% indicated corrosion failure as an important contributing
factor. This proportion of refinery accidents in eMARS with this profile has remained constant well
into the 21st century."

"Of the cases studied, corrosion failure originated predominantly in pipe works, causing 71% of the
accidents studied. Fifty percent of accidents involved the internal pipework of the equipment. As
noted in the previous section, 17% of the original failures took place in the pipeline infrastructure of
the plant for transfer between units and to and from transport modes, and 4% took place in tubes
associated with heat exchange and cooling units. Fifteen percent of the accidents occurred in storage
tanks."

These statistics help in building up a case when needed to get some prime focus.

From the same author, we had an article published in Loss Prevention Bulletin 246, IChmE during year 2015, and there were some notable issues, less we consider:

Take the first point first, we apply that less!

Inspecting to the relevant standard is not enough.
Common sense should also be applied to address specific
stressors associated with age, environment and working
conditions

Missing documentation can elevate risk. Having
complete documentation, in particular for older equipment,
is a problem common to older sites, especially where
process hazards are numerous. All documentation
limitations associated with equipment critical to safety
should be identified along with associated risks of not
having precise information on composition, functionality,
design parameters, etc.

Choosing to perform management of change should
not be an ad hoc decision. Sites cannot leave this up to
random decisions of staff involved. They need to establish
and follow criteria for when a management of change
procedure is necessary. The management of change in
refineries should automatically include an analysis of
potential increased corrosion risk for areas of known
elevated corrosion risk.

Refineries cannot take focus off their high risk
processes. Many processes in refineries are associated
with high risk of corrosion, including atmospheric and
vacuum distillation, hydrotreatment, and alkylation.
Moreover, the intensity of temperatures and temperature
fluctuations in heating and cooling elements, such as
air coolers and heat exchangers, are a factor that can
accelerate the corrosion process in the presence of certain
corrosive agents.

Equipment configuration matters. Hazard assessments
should pay particular attention to the potential for
accelerated corrosion in particular localised areas of
equipment, such as elbow joints, T-intersections and
welded sections. Elbow joints and T-joints exhibit particular
vulnerability to certain types of stresses, notably, vibration,
and external pressure from natural forces such as wind and
floods and additionally for elbow joints, erosion/corrosion
and low or uneven flow.

Welded areas can be a source of corrosion. The process
of welding is invasive and errors in miscalculation in
procedure can increase corrosion vulnerability of welded
areas. Welding is an entire field of study in itself and should
be entrusted to qualified experts.

Inaccessible equipment is not incidental to the inspection
routine. Pipes that are less accessible need to be inspected
with the same rigour as accessible pipes. Without
documentation, their condition and status cannot be
assumed from nearby, more accessible pipe sections.

The first point itself of inspecting beyond the relevant standard is something we consider not often.
I remember sorting out the active deadlegs with identified corrosion however not specifically appeared in our deadlegs database.

Ageing of assets is required to be analyzed, though we do have studies focused on plant ageing but they consider only the inspection reports outcome and not much.

Damages or the corrective maintenance work being performed should have a periodic analysis to adjust the preventive maintenance being performed.
We had reported failures on instrumentation being addressed through corrective maintenance support however nothing reported as part of their preventive plans.