In November of last year, Jean-Robert Claveau spearheaded an international team in conducting a maintenance audit at an aluminum smelter located outside of Canada. His noteworthy efforts were highlighted in an article featured in our client’s company newsletter.
The summary is found below
During Fall 2023, a reliability asset audit was conducted to identify major potential risks to a Refinery’s operations. The project, which was spearheaded by a client’s reliability department, identified and examined a list of assets that could disrupt the plant’s stable operations. The 5-day audit involved external auditors, including our own Jean-Robert Claveau, Reliability Consultant. According to a Mechanical Reliability Engineer working for the client, “the external auditors were paired with a team of six engineers from [the client’s] Reliability Department.
The leadership team across the refinery, along with the external auditors, used [the client’s] criticality ranking system to select the assets that required examination,” he explained. The audit also included physical visits to various departments to assess the assets and to develop the minimum technical solutions required to reduce any possible risks.
Eighty-seven risks were identified and ranked during the audit and included the lack of pre-treatment for a condensate stream leading to the polisher building, loose joint bars on a rail track leading to the railhead, and corrosion of a conveyor belt at the Port. The risks are now being addressed with the development of a pre-treatment system for the polisher building, and sandblasting/repairs on the conveyor belts. The loose joint bars that were identified have already been secured.
At the close out presentation, the auditors recommended solutions and their associated costs to the company’s leadership, and members of a committee. In his closing statement, Mr. Claveau commended the Reliability Department for its impressive system used to track the progress of previous audit actions and the high percentage of critical audit actions closed out from previous audits.
The next key steps arising from the audit are to track and monitor ongoing actions to ensure closure with a focus on the highest ranked risks, which, of course, is the client’s hands.
