The start-up sequence is a predefined set of steps and conditions required to safely start up a process or system. This sequence ensures that all necessary checks and safety measures are in place before operations begin. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Start-Up Sequence The start-up sequence is a predefined set of steps and conditions required to safely start up a process or system. This sequence ensures that all necessary checks and safety measures are in place before operations begin. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

Developing Hardware Details Hardware Design Specifications Developing Hardware Details aeSolutions works with clients to establish specific project standards for the detailed hardware design of the system and field I/O. • Input / Output database and signal types • Control system cabinet layout practices • Controller, I/O, and interface modules • HMI operator interface equipment • Control networks, switches, fiber optics, and cabling • Marshalling cabinets and interposing relays • Servers and clients • Engineering workstations • Purging, temperature, smoke and fire detection Automation Services Previous Next

Device failure, system failure, external event, or improper human action that begins a sequence of events leading to one or more undesired consequences of definable severity. Initiating events are considered during Process Hazard Analyses (PHAs) conducted by aeSolutions' trained facilitators. PHAs help companies identify hazard scenarios that could lead to a release of highly hazardous chemicals that can cause negative impact on people, the environment, and property. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Initiating Event Device failure, system failure, external event, or improper human action that begins a sequence of events leading to one or more undesired consequences of definable severity. Initiating events are considered during Process Hazard Analyses (PHAs) conducted by aeSolutions' trained facilitators. PHAs help companies identify hazard scenarios that could lead to a release of highly hazardous chemicals that can cause negative impact on people, the environment, and property. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

A trip point is a specific value or condition that, when reached, triggers an automatic shutdown or safety action. Trip points are set to protect systems from operating outside safe or permissible limits. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Trip Point A trip point is a specific value or condition that, when reached, triggers an automatic shutdown or safety action. Trip points are set to protect systems from operating outside safe or permissible limits. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

Achieving a High-Risk Systems Overhaul on an Accelerated Schedule When TGES America, Ltd. needed a critical overhaul of the complex control system and instrumentation for the central utilities plant (CUP) of a specialty materials manufacturing plant, they turned to aeSolutions, a Siemens Solution Partner. Subsequently, due to the need to complete the project four months early, the planned cold cutover to the new systems had to be done as a hot cutover without disrupting production. TGES America, aeSolutions, and Siemens made it happen, much to the delight of the customer. Challenge Unreliable, legacy controls disrupting production, undermining customer trust, and triggering financial penalties. Solution Engage an expert partner to design, engineer, and install fully modern and ultra-reliable systems for CUP controls and monitoring. Results Improved margins and a repeatable reference model for TGES America — with reliable plant utilities and customer trust restored. Read more about aeSolutions' comprehensive hydrogen risk management and hazard mitigation services Previous Story Next Story

Any operation that uses flames or can produce sparks (e.g., welding). Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Hot Work Any operation that uses flames or can produce sparks (e.g., welding). Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

A project management process during early stages of a project designed to minimize risk for investors and other stakeholders by developing adequate project definition & scope. aeSolutions uses front end loading in multiple types of projects. We invite you explore our service types to learn more. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions What is front end loading A project management process during early stages of a project designed to minimize risk for investors and other stakeholders by developing adequate project definition & scope. aeSolutions uses front end loading in multiple types of projects. We invite you explore our service types to learn more. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

The range within which the alarm is activated and then cleared. Dead band does not impact the setpoint upon which the alarm annunciates. aeSolutions can supply expertise at all stages of alarm management including consulting, training, and facilitating rationalization teams, followed by full design and implementation services. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Hysteresis (dead band) The range within which the alarm is activated and then cleared. Dead band does not impact the setpoint upon which the alarm annunciates. aeSolutions can supply expertise at all stages of alarm management including consulting, training, and facilitating rationalization teams, followed by full design and implementation services. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

Large Specialty Chemical Company Reduces Alarm Floods A large specialty chemical company was facing alarm floods in their utility unit. With aeSolutions guidance, the site was able to effectively prioritize and reduce alarms through the rationalization process, which includes reviewing, validating, and justifying alarms needed for avoiding potential process upsets or abnormal deviations from normal operation. Challenge As a result of the alarm floods, the Operators were reluctant or delayed in responding to the current alarm system because they were unable to determine which alarms were important and which were much less urgent or unnecessary. This reduced the time that staff had to respond to urgent or high priority operating conditions and diverted their attention from other important duties. The site had not yet performed alarm rationalization of their utility unit. As a result, the control room Operators were overwhelmed with nuisance alarms, incorrectly prioritized alarms, and alarms with no Operator action. This produced an operating environment susceptible to safety or environmental hazards that could have resulted in an incident. Solution aeSolutions facilitated a rationalization process with site operations and engineering staff to identify and prioritize the most effective alarms to detect a process upset within the utility unit while ensuring alarms met the definition and requirements defined within the client’s existing site Alarm Management Philosophy. By using the aeAlarm™ Rationalization Tool, the team was able to efficiently and functionally perform the following tasks: • Incorporate Process Hazard Analysis (PHA) and Layers of Protection Analysis (LOPA) data, such as required Operator responses used as Independent Protection Layers (IPLs) to reduce scenario risk to a tolerable level • Document alarm attributes based on the International Society of Automation (ISA) 18.2 and the Alarm Philosophy which addresses how alarms will be managed throughout the ISA 18.2 lifecycle • Review alarm parameters and setpoints to ensure they were aligned with the unit’s safe operating limits • Create templates for similar alarms within similar equipment trains Results The client’s control room achieved a two-thirds reduction in alarms configured for the utility unit which increased operator performance and production efficiency. The optimization of the alarm system also returned the client to compliance with Recognized and Generally Acceptable Good Engineering Practices (RAGAGEP) for Alarm Management. Overall, the operating staff became more focused on safe and effective operations because Operators were finally able to trust that the alarms they were addressing were accurate, necessary and important. Learn more about how aeSolutions could help you with a similar Alarm project. Industry: Chemicals Geography: Gulf Coast Unit Operation: Utilities Governing Authority: ISA 18.2 Read more about aeSolutions' comprehensive hydrogen risk management and hazard mitigation services Previous Story Next Story

Alarm Management for a Greenfield LNG Facility A Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) facility was being newly constructed (i.e., Greenfield) and the company wanted to conduct an alarm rationalization on the process prior to initial startup. Existing facilities (i.e., Brownfield) have the benefit of historical operating trends and data during a rationalization session to recognize whether setpoints are effective and which alarms might give troubles. Without any operating data for the Greenfield LNG facility, however, the alarm program and rationalization process based alarm setpoints; on cause and effects, the site’s PHA, and RAGAGEP engineering design for the LNG industry. Challenge Setting up an alarm system for a new facility with no real site experience required relying on both the client’s and the aeSolutions team’s experience from other LNG facilities. The alarm rationalization sessions required very proficient engineers, instrumentation personnel, and senior-level operators to ensure a knowledge base strong enough to appropriately identify alarms and the actions to be taken. A heavily experienced and technical team was necessary to understand the process hazards and responses to those hazards. The project timeliness also presented challenges to meet all the schedule deadlines of the multiple vendors involved in the LNG process startup, with consideration that stakeholder activities were contingent on one another. There was a higher sense of urgency than in a Brownfield facility as a result of reduced flexibility in the sense that the alarm system and training needed to be completed prior to startup. Solution aeSolutions organized and facilitated team meetings to capture process knowledge and hazard identification with adherence to industry guidelines and standards. The following tasks were accomplished: • Reviewed the client alarm philosophy and performed a gap assessment with the requirements in the International Society of Automation (ISA) 18.2 standard. An effective alarm philosophy is the foundation of an alarm management program and covers all its elements, including design principles, key performance indicators, roles and responsibilities, alarm presentation standards, alarm priority assignment, alarm system maintenance, management of change, auditing, and escalation policies. • Developed the client’s documentation and rationalization (D&R) site protocol; the D&R site protocol is a guideline created to ensure consistent and effective expectations on future rationalization activities. • Performed a rules of engagement meeting where templates were developed prior to the alarm rationalization activities. Templates were created for similar alarm types (e.g., bad PV) and similar process alarms (e.g., ESD, PSD, and safety showers). • Performed a training on the alarm management lifecycle prior to rationalizing the LNG process systems and utilities. During the rationalization meetings, a checklist of specific questions was analyzed and documented for each unique alarm. The questions generated team discussion on alarm basis (e.g., setpoint, response time, etc.), characteristics (class, attributes, etc.), and whether alarms met the definition of the alarm specified in the alarm philosophy. Results The Greenfield LNG facility was prepared and trained with a well-established alarm system prior to startup. The site had a finalized version of the alarm philosophy, D&R site protocol, and completed master alarm database, which included all ISA 18.2 required information and alarm response requirements for the process. The alarm philosophy is customizable to establish rules for improving and managing the alarm system and should be utilized as a reference to guide a site’s strategy for sustained improvement. With the Greenfield LNG facility alarm philosophy in place, alarm system design and/or improvement can proceed with maximum benefits, including reduced costs, improved safety, and improved reliability. See how we can help you with a similar alarm project. Industry: LNG Geography: Gulf Coast Unit Operation: Alarm Rationalization, Alarm Management Read more about aeSolutions' comprehensive hydrogen risk management and hazard mitigation services Previous Story Next Story

An arc flash is a dangerous electrical explosion or discharge that occurs when a high-voltage current travels through the air between conductors or from a conductor to ground. It can result in severe injuries, burns, and equipment damage due to the intense heat, light, and pressure generated by the flash. Acronyms & Terms Glossary <- More Definitions Arc Flash Hazard An arc flash is a dangerous electrical explosion or discharge that occurs when a high-voltage current travels through the air between conductors or from a conductor to ground. It can result in severe injuries, burns, and equipment damage due to the intense heat, light, and pressure generated by the flash. Our Services Processing Magazine: The Need for a Control System Migration: Building the Case to Upper Management Check out our article in Processing Magazine where Tom McGreevy discusses tips to earn the support of leadership when proposing a control system migration. Chemical Processing: How They Made It Work: aeSolutions' FGS 1300 Fire and Gas Alarm Controller Check out our coverage in Chemical Processing's "How They Made It Work" series. PHA Revalidations | Beyond Checking Boxes Keep your facility safe and compliant — don’t let your PHA become a “check-the-box” task. Regular, well-executed PHA revalidations identify evolving risks and turn findings into action, ensuring lasting protection for your people, assets, and operations.

Looking Ahead Lifecycle and Upgrade Planning Looking Ahead aeSolutions can provide the client with strategies, alternatives, and estimates for upgrades and migrations of safety and control systems. • Current state versus obsolescence • Software upgrades • Hardware upgrades • Platform and vendor migrations • Integration opportunities • Safety and Control System harmonizing • Expansions Automation Services Previous Next