Pressure Testing Your Plant?

Share this Post Or Bookmark

Close Bookmark and Share This Page

Save to Browser Favorites / Bookmarks

Ask backflip blinklist BlogBookmark Bloglines BlogMarks Blogsvine BuddyMarks BUMPzee! CiteULike Connotea del.icio.us

Digg diigo DotNetKicks DropJack dzone Facebook Fark Faves Friendsite folkd.com Furl Google

Jamespot Jeqq Kaboodle kirtsy linkaGoGo LinkedIn Ma.gnolia Mister Wong Mixx MySpace Netvouz Newsvine

oneview OnlyWire PlugIM Propeller Reddit Segnalo Shoutwire Simpy Slashdot Surphace Sphinn Spurl

Squidoo StumbleUpon Technorati ThisNext Twitter Webride Windows Live Yahoo!

Email This to a Friend

  Link HTML: 

 Permalink: 

 If you like this then please subscribe to the RSS Feed.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

More »

Is your processing plant safe?  Can you be sure that if a cataclysmic event occurs, will your plant a) survive? b) if not, will the surrounding environment suffer? or c) will you be able to resume production after repairs taking a few weeks?  The answer may be how long is a piece of string or it could be that initial design and production assumptions have changed and it is now time to carry out a ‘pressure test’.

You may have seen in the paper today, the news that the Japanese nuclear operators going to ‘pressure test’ all 54 of their nuclear generation plant as a direct result of the Fukushima Daiichi plant disaster in which they were subjected to an unprecedented earthquake measuring 9.0 on the richter scale followed minutes later by a huge tsunami from the sea.

Apparently, these stress tests are to evaluate the ‘resilience’ of  each of the plant to continue to operate safely or at worst, shut down safely and contain any fissionable material within its reactor vessels.  For most who do not have a passing knowledge of nuclear plant or plant in general, it is hard to imagine what this test could be.  Is it a test to destruction? – No, that’s plainly not sensible as currently, Japan is still reeling from the consequences of the disaster with only 19 of their 54 nuclear generators in service and of course, further failures cannot be contemplated.

The real answer is that Stress testing is political and media short-hand for risk assessment that is to be carried out over a period of months for each plant.  I don’t know about you, but risk assessment doesn’t have the sense of immediacy or importance that the term stress testing has. It’s a bit like the clamour for a public inquiry in the UK in the wake of a disaster – somebody has to do something!

The problem is that unprecedented cataclysmic  events are, by its very definition, not predictable.  If plant designs had to take account of worst case scenarios, then nothing would ever get built in the nuclear line.  I have absolutely no inside information except to say that risk assessments are part of the routine processes of creating and thereafter maintaining any plant, nuclear, petrochemical or any other.

600-Station Geodetic Array in Japan

The stress test in this case has to mean reassessing both internal operating factors and external environmental factors have changed and applying it to the plant design.   Japan is in the most active earthquake area in the World with three major fault lines passing close by most of their nuclear plants.  It is no surprise that geodetic arrays with over 600 monitoring sites was set up in 1996 by the Geological Institute (GSI) of Japan to develop not only an earthquake prediction model, but also to assess their earthquake building codes.

The fact is that Japan did make what they thought were the correct design assumptions based on this developing body of monitoring data but even their 10 metre-high tsunami wall at  Fukushima Daiichi was easily over-topped.  So a review with a new risk assessment (pressure test) is required that focuses more, perhaps on the environmental and loss-of-life potential.

No doubt, there will be no more news for quite a while except for rumblings in the Japanese Diet (Parliament) and by international environmentalists who want to shut the global nuclear industry.  The only headlines along with an enormous amount of flack in the media, will come if any of the much-needed 54 nuclear generators in Japan are forced to close permanently due to its pressure test. Cries of deceit and corruption will no doubt be in the wake of the furore.

I hope your processing plant is safe from all that the Planet can hurl at it as can be ‘reasonably’ predicted and that the consequences are minimised.  Let’s hope your risk assessment processes are up-to-date, observed and reasonably free from political or financial influences.

Hasta mañana