PINK CITY TURNS BLACK.
The agony of failure to detect fire in vital installations of reputed companies opens a wide debate over the inadequate system for fire and safety detection and protection which lacks in safety audit. It opens a Pandora’s Box of WHYs, WHATs and WHENs? The reference is to the Indian Oil Corporation’s fuel depot in Sitapura Industrial Area, on the outskirts of Jaipur.

To show sympathy and in order to avoid people’s wrath, a few lakh rupees will be distributed. To subdue the situation, citizens’ tax money will be used to establish a panel to investigate the cause of the incident, and the report will have an expiry date to choose a way to waste paper without any implementation of corrective measures. Such is the hierarchy rigidly imbibed in the management of state owned companies and is supported with ample ignorance under political cloud.

I have spent a lifetime in the Oil & Gas sector serving in vital installations abroad with over 35 years of experience in engineering and maintaining instrumentation & control systems without loss of man-hours. This exposure leads me to painful thoughts over such fateful events.

Managements boast to the Government of their cost cutting measures by presenting in budgetary estimates, (with justification) that the expenditure for Safety and Control Systems is unnecessary, describing them as high maintenance accessories and as the reason for increase in Capital Cost of installation. This reveals the pure ignorance of present technologies and a lack of understanding in the implementation of these technologies to increase safety standards in plants. Even a single incident in a million operational hours can result into an inferno, like the one at the ONGC Bombay High offshore platform or Vizac refinery.

It is my sincere suggestion to the Ministry of Petroleum to make mandatory for any plant / tank farm / pipeline / upstream-downstream above ground installation to be strictly subjected to safety audits and the implementation of FIRE AND ALARM SYSTEMS WITH FIRE PROTECTION SYSTEM, fire hydrants / sprinklers and SCADA as the central control centre system.

A regulatory body should be formed with specialized and experienced personnel from engineering consultant companies or fire fighting institutions to carry out safety audits in all installations which belong to the government or private sector. Failure to implement should attract punitive measures with heavy penalties. Such a move will help bring a halt to the loss of lives and the abuse being caused to environment. It will also help increase efficiency and productivity.

The very desire to break away from established norms of doing things is essentially warranted to achieve higher levels of security, safety and productivity in the hydro carbon sector. This is only possible with the implementation of high tech intelligent systems. It is necessary to have commitment and cooperation among all levels of management including the trade unions. It is futile to say that automation results in manpower redundancy which is not true. Contrarily, human errors are avoided by intelligent devices yielding high safety standards and productivity without loss of valuable man-hours and giving higher profit ratios.

Government should ratify laws for segregation and establishment of such plants / tank farms away from populated areas, schools, hospitals and public places. Can we foresee such laws to be passed by law makers in the House of Parliament? The concerned ministry in the central government ought to initiate these measures to avoid future catastrophes.

India has a pool of talent with many international reputed engineering consultant companies like SAIPEM S.p.A., Engineers India, Technip, Kværner, Uhde, Mott MacDonald, Technomont, Worley Parson, etc. and also with state-of-art technology companies like Larson and Toubro, Emerson, Yokogawa, ABB, Honeywell, Allen Bradley, Invensys, etc. to provide the best of solutions.

An initial capital cost investment by tapping this pool will provide an efficient system with a high potential of safety, and superior control over quality, productivity and operations of its plants and establishments.

Can we not justify this change of looking at automation for a better, greener tomorrow for the following generation and the 2020 Vision of India as depicted by our honorable Prime minister Dr. Manmohan Singh?

Shashikant Tandale
Technical Advisor
(Instrumentation / Control / SCADA / Telecom)
Sharjah, UAE