Planning Construction Activity to Support the Startup Process

Owners planning any new facility, particularly one which is a production facility, usually are intent upon that facility being available by a specific date to meet a market goal. Thus, they desire that any activity with the potential to influence that availability be carefully planned and made as efficient as possible. CII Publication 6-3, Model Planning and Controlling System for EPC of Industrial Projects, describes the procedure for optimizing the process. That publication asserts that while facility startup itself must be accomplished in an efficient and orderly sequence, it is equally important that all preceding construction activity be completed in time to support the startup process, and that procurement and engineering be completed to support the construction process.

When speaking of startup, one is referring to startup of systems within the facility. A system is any assemblage of structural, mechanical, electrical, and instrumentation components providing a function or service. Just as a work breakdown structure has many levels, many levels of systems exist within a process or manufacturing facility. In effect, the entire plant is one huge system that is made up of many separate systems and subsystems.

This publication is concerned with the planning of construction to support startup. While some discussion of startup is included to help the reader understand the constructor’s role in the process, major emphasis is on how the constructor converts from a mode which is most cost-effective from a construction viewpoint to one which is most cost-effective from an overall plant viewpoint.