It's disheartening for your refinery to have months of stellar production numbers, only to have unexpected repairs put a screeching halt to your momentum. One way to combat this problem is by utilizing turnaround management services.
Turnaround management services can help your refinery integrate planned shutdowns (known as turnarounds) into your schedule. During the turnaround, your daily operations will cease and all labor efforts will focus on completing maintenance and repairs. Keep reading to learn more about how a turnaround management service will benefit your company.
1. You Can Better Adjust Your Production Schedule in Advance
One of the downfalls of unexpected maintenance and repairs is that they negatively impact your production. Your customers depend on your refinery's ability to produce enough product to fulfill their orders. If you're unable to satisfy their orders, this can lead to regional shortages. Even planned turnarounds can cause problems if there isn't ample planning prior to the shutdown.
The length of time that a refinery turnaround takes is anywhere from a few weeks to a few months, depending on the goals of the turnaround. Since you know about this shutdown in advance, you can try to ramp up production before the turnaround to meet customer demand. Or, you might need to have another refinery handle customers that your refinery typically serves.
2. A Turnaround Management Service Can Assist With Transitioning Employees
During a turnaround, the duties of your employees will shift. Instead of operating refinery machinery, your employees will need to take on some of the maintenance and cleaning tasks scheduled for the turnaround.
A turnaround management service will assist you with ensuring your employees receive the training and supervision they need to safely and efficiently complete their turnaround duties. If you'll need to hire additional workers to expedite the turnaround, the management service can assist with the logistics of hiring and training these new employees.
3. You Can Shorten the Length of Your Turnaround With a Management Service
Even a short turnaround can massively decrease your company's income. You need to strive for the shortest turnaround possible that still enables your company to complete all its scheduled tasks. Extensive planning before the turnaround is essential to help everything go as planned.
Your turnaround management service will help with these planning efforts. They'll make sure that you start preparing for your turnaround in advance so that you have all the materials, parts, and labor you need for the shutdown.
You don't want to stop your normal operations and learn that a part for your distillation unit is on backorder. Details like this will be taken care of before the turnaround.