Plant Shutdowns Made Simple

Plant shutdowns can happen for a variety of reasons. Sometimes they’re planned, sometimes they’re not. Sometimes they’re major, and other times they are an inconvenience handled with relative ease. Despite all this, one thing is certain: plant shutdowns will happen and our job is to ensure that the shutdown process is conducted efficiently enough to minimize process disruption and effectively enough that the customer process will quickly return to optimal operation.

Background

Our customer, a combined-cycle gas turbine plant in Pennsylvania, reached out to us regarding an upcoming plant shutdown at their facility. A specific set of equipment (over 200 instruments) needed calibrating. Our service coordinators established a team consisting of highly-trained and experienced technicians Michael Mercer (Team Lead), Ron Gibson, Cesar Perez, Dave Golish, and Rob Carrick.

Situation

The initial scope of work included only the instrument calibrations; however, during the plant outage, a turbine within the plant broke down. This turned a “planned” shutdown into an emergency shutdown situation, while doubling the outage from 6 days to 12. Our team spent over 650-man hours at our customer’s plant working hard to ensure everything was running smoothly by the time they were done.

Takeaways

This customer’s plant shutdown could have turned into a disaster without the proper planning and experience Eastern Controls’ service technicians bring with them to each project they’re faced with.

ECI’s wide range of calibration support (covering instrumentation, gas detection, and positioner upgrades) coupled with our diagnostic capabilities, enables superior levels of preventative maintenance, minimizing any potential risk and your overall shutdown time.

A follow-up review is conducted to discuss the outage in detail and identify any areas of concern after all outage work has been completed.

ECI Outage Solutions

Consider these points when preparing for a planned or unplanned outage. This standard process can lead your plant to operate more efficiently in a shorter amount of time, while keeping your workforce safe. Plant shutdowns can be difficult. You can rely on our highly-trained service professionals to conduct your plant shutdown in a minimally-disruptive manner and return your plant to optimum performance after shutdown completion.

For more information on ECI’s outage solutions for the upcoming outage season, check out our video below.