Bahrain Petroleum Company (Bapco) has completed the turnaround and inspection (T&I) of its low sulphur diesel plant (LSDP).

The T&I was unique and the largest-ever in Bapco's history. It represents a strategic option for Bapco and serves its expansion plans in future.

The shutdown team managed to successfully overcome obstacles and complete the major shutdown work in all process units' T&I in the shortest possible period.

The shutdown of Hub 1, which began on February 16, suggests one activity, but it was actually a cluster of shutdowns involving a number of inter-related process units.

'The Hub 1 T&I was considered as part of the company strategy when plans for managing future turnaround projects were drawn,' a company spokesman said.

'The idea of the Hub philosophy was to combine one conversion unit with one crude distillation unit and with one vacuum distillation unit so that maximum Lost Profit Opportunity can be gained from this arrangement,' he added.

Around 320 major pieces of equipment such as reactors, columns, heat exchangers and furnaces were isolated, opened, cleaned, inspected and repaired and more than 1,000 valves of various types were overhauled or replaced.

At its peak, almost 2,500 company and contractor personnel were engaged on Hub 1, the majority of whom worked around the clock, amassing over one million man-hours worked.

'The success of the Hub 1 T&I was due to a number of factors, mainly the planning and the dedication of shutdown team,' the spokesman added.

'As a consequence, the Hub 1 T&I was one of the smoothest multi-unit shutdown that was ever experienced in Bapco.

'A major technical problem was encountered on LSDP that was unique to Bapco.

'The LSDP T&I had a specific technical problem related to the weld repair of a material in high-alloy metallurgy.

'The critical activity on the LSDP T&I was the replacement of the Cold Collector on the Reformer Furnace.

'This included a large number of very specialised welds involving welding new equipment to old, sensitised material.

'However, the problem was handled in the best and most professional manner through the full time commitment of Bapco dedicated personnel and assistance by expertise from the manufacturer,' he added

In total, almost 1.1 million man hours were worked on Hub 1 without a lost time injury or non-lost time injury. This is unprecedented in the history of shutdowns in Bapco.-TradeArabia News Service