Strategies to Maximize Plant Productivity
by Sulaiman Sultan Mohammad, Kuwait National Petroleum Company
Kirk Blanchard, Valero Energy, St. Charles Refinery
George DeBakey, AP Networks
Bassam Samman, CMCS
Dean Edmundson, Primavera Systems
Executive Summary
Increased project complexity and pressure to improve plant up-time has driven many improvements in the process industry over the last decade. At leading companies, some of this improvement is due to the identification and repeated implementation of best practices gathered through benchmarking and incorporated into standardized project management systems. Many organizations have subsequently tried to adopt such practices and some have succeeded, though others have had more difficulty. While project management technology has improved considerably in the last 10 years, there is a large knowledge gap developing in the industry as seasoned professionals continue to retire, taking decades of expertise with them and leaving a significant void in their wake.
The challenges to effective project management are numerous, but the following are a few of the most common:
• Inability to identify risks;
• Independent scheduling by department;
• Limited resource forecasting;
• Rapidly retiring workforce;
• Missed turnaround objectives and blown budgets.
The authors of this paper represent the experience of two best-in-class oil refining companies: Valero Energy and Kuwait National Petroleum Company; two established consulting organizations serving this industry: AP Networks and CMCS; and a leading developer of software solutions in project management: Primavera. The goal of the paper is to shed light on practical ways to achieve improved profitability in the utilization of labor and non-labor resources during major projects.
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