Alarm Management for Process Control

This book elevates alarm management from a fragmented collection ofprocedures, metrics, experiences, and trial-and-error, to the level of a technologydiscipline. It provides a complete treatment of best practices in alarm management. The technology and approaches found here provide the opportunity to completelyunderstand the what, the why, and the how of successful alarm systems. No modern industrial enterprise, particularly in such areas as chemicalprocessing, can operate without a secure and reliable infrastructure of alarms andcontrols-they are an integral part of all production management and controlsystems. Improving alarm management is an effective way to provide operatorswith high-value support and guidance to successfully manage industrial plantoperations. Readers will find: Recommendations and guidelines are developed from fundamental conceptsto provide powerful technical tools and workable approaches; Alarms are treated as indicators of abnormal situations, not simply sensorreadings that might be out of position; Alarm improvement is intimately linked to infrastructure management,including the vital role of plant maintenance to alarm management, theneed to manage operators' charter to continue to operate during abnormalsituations vs. cease operation, and the importance of situation awarenesswithout undue reliance upon alarms. The ability to appreciate technical issues is important, but this book requiresno previous specific technical, educational, or experiential background. The style and content are very accessible to a broad industrial audiencefrom board operator to plant manager. All critical tasks are explainedwith workflow processes, examples, and insight into what it all means.Alternatives are offered everywhere to enable users to tailor-make solutionsto their particular sites.