November 2008 Section Meeting

API Recommended Practice 14C & T-2 Certification
Recommended Practice for Analysis, Design, Installation, and Testing of Basic Surface Safety Systems

This month's luncheon program topic is American Petroleum Institute Recommended Practice 14C ( API RP 14C ) which presents recommendations for designing, installing, and testing a basic surface safety system on an offshore production platform. However, RP 14C is also often used for onshore facilities, since there is no equivalent onshore RP.

In addition, if a prospective employee has a certificate from T-2 Basic Production Safety System Training, their ability to contribute to an organization can be more easily evaluated. "T-2" is not a comprehensive certification program like Certified Automation Professional (CAP), Certified Control System Technician (CCST) or a government-sponsored licensing program such as the Control System Engineer Professional Engineer (CSE PE) licensing programs, but it is a readily available, standardized training program.

Join your fellow ISA members for lunch and learn more about this very interesting topic! More info about RP 14C below.

Meeting Details
RSVP: Lisa Denke at lld@bry.com or (661) 201-7842.
Date: November 20, 2008
Time: 11:30 am
Cost: $15
Place: Cataldo's Pizza , 650 Roberts Lane, Bakersfield, (661) 387-0965
Directions: Online map and directions

Future Events
Jan 15, 2009 - DNP3 Protocol
May 14, 2009 - Golf Tournament
May 15, 2009 - Tabletop Show, Cajun Feast, Technical Training
May 28, 2009 - Kick-in / Kick-out Ceremony

About API RP 14C

The API document on Recommended Practice 14C presents recommendations for designing, installing, and testing a basic surface safety system on an offshore production platform. The basic concepts of a platform safety system are discussed and protection methods and requirements of the system are outlined.

This recommended practice illustrates how system analysis methods can be used to determine safety requirements to protect any process component. Actual analyses of the principal components are developed in such a manner that the requirements determined will be applicable whenever the component is used in the process. The safety requirements of the individual process components may then be integrated into a complete platform safety system. The analysis procedures include a method to document and verify system integrity. A uniform method of identifying and symbolizing safety devices is presented and the analysis method is exemplified by a sample process system.

In addition to the basic surface safety system, this recommended practice covers ancillary systems such as pneumatic supply and liquid containment. Procedures for testing common safety devices are presented with recommendations for test data and acceptable test tolerances.

This recommended practice emphasizes pneumatic systems since they are the most commonly used; however, the same principles and procedures are applicable to hydraulic and electrical systems and to systems incorporating two or more control media. Instrumentation logic circuits are not discussed since these should be left to the discretion of the designer as long as the recommended safety functions are accomplished. Rotating machinery is considered in this recommended practice as a unitized process component as it interfaces with the platform safety system. When rotating machinery (such as a pump or compressor) installed as a unit consists of several process components, each component can be analyzed as prescribed in this recommended practice.

Excerpt from API RP 14C - Safety Analysis for Production Platforms :

The basic premise prescribed by API RP 14C is that the safety system should provide two levels of protection to prevent or minimize the impact of piping or equipment failure that can result in the release of hydrocarbons from the process. The two levels of protection should be independent of and supplemental to devices used for normal process operation, and should be provided by functionally different types of safety devices.

Section 4.2 of API RP 14C lists several undesirable events that can occur in the process, along with potential causes, effects, detectable abnormal conditions and devices typically used to provide primary and secondary protection against the occurrence and escalation of the event. Expanding on the concepts listed in Section 4.2, Appendix A of the document presents a complete safety analysis of each basic process component normally used in an offshore platform production system. For each basic process component (i.e. flow line, pressure vessel, pump, etc), a list of the required safety devices is provided. This list of required safety devices initially considers each component separate from the rest of the process. The Safety Analysis Checklist (SAC) for individual components is then used to justify elimination of safety devices where protection is afforded by virtue of the service conditions or by other redundant devices either upstream or downstream in the process.







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Last updated December 4, 2008