Right place, right time
Bayernoil refinery shutdown: planning down to the finest detail

In April this year, ThyssenKrupp Xervon completed one of the biggest shutdown project in the company’s history. Over a period of four weeks at Bayernoil in Neustadt, Germany, more than 360 employees were in action at the same time. Everything is proceeding to a gigantic, complex program in which the various tasks and manpower assignments are presicely defined.

The lofty industrial stacks catch the eye from a distance. On arrival at the plant site, a big, white banner above the entrance gate proclaims the safety motto of the week: “All accidents can be avoided. First think and take precautions—then act!” Behind it is a landscape of countless temporary office containers. And beyond them is the construction site proper: The northern part of the Bayern-oil refinery in Neustadt, currently a hive of industry. Hundreds of men in overalls and protective gear—as many as 1,200 at peak times—make their way by bike or on foot, with or without tools, with faces blackened and filthy or still clean, across the 25,000 square meter site occupied by the installations undergoing refurbishment during the four-week shutdown.

Only on the surface is this scenario somewhat chaotic. In fact, everything is proceeding to a gigantic, complex program in which the various tasks and manpower assignments are precisely defined. This master plan comes from ThyssenKrupp Xervon, a company acting as the main partner company with up to 360 employees working on site.
Capman in use
The industrial service provider is a genuine professional—its over 300 successfully completed large-scale shutdowns in the chemical and petrochemical industries, its own shutdown department in Ingolstadt that centrally plans and supervises all turnarounds, and, last but not least, the recently successfully completed, biggest shutdown project in the company’s history, with three concurrent large and two “small” shutdowns, speak for themselves. The secret of this success is its wealth of experience, the right equipment and tried-and-tested logistical systems.
ThyssenKrupp Xervon resorts above all to the CAPMAN planning software, developed in the company itself, that helps all those in charge to get the right number of men to the right place at the right time. Every evening, Project Manager Richard Wolfstaedter checks the state of progress. All the work completed during the day is entered in the system and evaluated. The evaluation shows precisely whether the shutdown team is ahead of, on or behind schedule. If one team is ahead of plan, the staff is redeployed in those areas where a slower team is lagging behind, so as to get everything back on track. Shutdowns are renowned for frequent unscheduled and unforeseeable tasks, and then it is essential to organize extra manpower as quickly as possible.
The Southern Region can fall back at any time on a pool of about five to ten permanent partner and manpower leasers. This is of huge importance, because the service provider can never afford a delay in the overall time-scale set by the customer. Every extra day that the inspection takes is enormously costly for the plant operator, and the shutdown team’s reputation would be ruined. However, there is no need to worry on this score. Andreas Freutsmiedl, Regional Manager at ThyssenKrupp Xervon, puts the record straight: “For shutdown projects we are only interested in companies with whom we have had good experience over many years and most of whose staff we know. The refinery and petrochemicals sector is extremely sensitive. There’s no alternative to highly skilled staff.”
Safety first
And because not only quality and flexibility are demanded by plant operator Bayernoil and ThyssenKrupp Xervon, but also safety, all employees are trained in SCC safety management and receive detailed safety instruction again before starting work in the Bayernoil refinery. But this is not all. To ensure that all the applicable rules and regulations are observed and any questions that arise are settled, the industrial service provider has a safety expert constantly on site—the HSEQ Manager. It is his job to also hold so-called toolbox meetings every day. This is where ThyssenKrupp Xervon staff are briefed again by their group leaders on current topics. Only when safety is ensured for everyone concerned can work start. In the case of the Bayern-oil shutdown, the employees are divided up into different teams. These are responsible for the inspection and repair of heat exchangers, tanks, machines, columns and air coolers. The shutdown specialist also handles the entire job scheduling, so the customer has very little to take care of himself. ThyssenKrupp Xervon obtains the necessary tools and machines, cranes and scaffolds. Bayernoil is merely responsible for procuring the replacement and spare parts fitted in the aftermath of inspection of the installations.