Research And Application On BIM-based Off-site Maintenance For Petrochemical Equipment

On-site maintenance(ONSM) is taken as the universal equipment maintenance schema in the petrochemical industry. Yet many accidents take place during the ONSM processes, due to unstable equipment, complicated work environment and human errors. A new maintenance schema is critical to reduce the probability for accidents during the petrochemical equipment maintenance processes.The problems existed in the equipment maintenance management are firstly analyzed. Based on the characteristics of petrochemical equipment maintenance and the safety benefits of off-site operations, off-site maintenance(OFSM) for petrochemical equipment is proposed, along with the analysis of its implementing condition and processes. Afterwards, information requirements for OFSM are analyzed. A support BIM system for OFSM is developed, which makes use of visualization, information management and localization capabilities. A case study utilizing OFSM and its support system for an oil-loading facility in Ningxia Petrochemical Company is proposed.The application results indicated that the implementation of the BIM-based off-site maintenance can significantly reduce operating risks and improve maintenance efficiency. Under controlled work environment, along with the minimization of on-site risky operations, less congestion and reduction of exposing time to hazards, the improvement of maintenance safety performance is realized. The application of visualization, information management and localization capabilities facilitate the identification of maintenance, the localization of maintenance object and its relevant information. Thus the maintenance efficiency is improved.