Practitioner notes

This page will be devoted to problems encountered in actual project engineering and management.

Plant availability

There is a widespread confusion between the plant availability and the plant reliability. The latter relates to the procured equipment failure rate and is the negotiation point of the project package whereas the first is not as it depends on the repair capabilities of the plant personnel and the adopted preventive maintenance plan (PMP). It necessarily includes such time-consuming procedures as CIP cleaning and the membranes reshuffling and replacement. [->Full text]

Plant operation modes

Plant production capacity and operation modes are 2 inseparable halves. The clients and the designers shall be in full agreement about them as they may define “a family car” or ‘a racer’ differing in price by more than 100%! For example, the seawater intake filtering system withstanding the jellyfish inrush lasting just several days a year is 3 times more expensive than the ordinary traveling band screens. [->Full text]

Pump selection: trifles make perfection

Times are gone when the pump selection was boiled down to the definition of the head, flow rate and material of construction. Nowadays high-capacity high-head pumps for desalination applications are a sophisticated piece of equipment always custom-tailored to the client requests. These pumps are a critical path component of the project schedule and the major contributor to the overall energy consumption of the plant. Below is an overview of key points that may help you in deciding which pump is right for you, and may enhance the performance and reliability of your pump at no cost. [->Full text]

Project specification

The ambiguous project specification is the perfect reason for the losing bidder to apply to court and have the deal halted and the bid evaluation results re-considered. Surprisingly high percentage of court applications (nearing 50% of all tenders, the author estimate) warrants closer insight into the project specification objectives and structure. [->to be continued soon ]