Reliability and maintainability analysis of the petroleum transfer system in Skikda refinery – Algeria

Abstract

Purpose The maintenance of industrial systems has become a necessary element for the development of companies seeking to conquer more and more markets. In our case study, we are interested in the transfer system whose main role is to transfer crude oil to the refinery. This paper describes the reliability, availability and maintainability evaluation of the refining system in Skikda refinery (Algeria).The transfer system was divided into three subsystems A, B and C and the results of each subsystem were obtained along with the main system. The aim of this study is to perform RAM analysis of the transfer system in order to identify the faults and repair patterns in the main transfer system. Design/methodology/approach Furthermore, estimation of RAM characteristics, identifying the critical subsystem that needs improvement or repair, and ultimately providing an optimal maintenance plan for the transfer system are the objectives of this paper. In our work we used the Weibull law in order to determine the reliability of the system. Findings The analysis results indicated that the reliability of transfer subsystems B and C after 1,200 and 1,400 h reaches zero, respectively. Moreover, availability results showed that all subsystems are available for more than 89 percent of the time, but after the study that we have done, we can raise it to 98 percent by reducing the waiting time. Originality/value The original contribution of this work is to give a new maintenance policy to achieve maximum availability of the strategic petroleum transfer system with lower costs.