Over the past few years, process safety management system compliance audits have revealed that organizations often have significant opportunities for improving their mechanical integrity programs. The Center for Chemical Process Safety has undertaken this project to develop this new book in the Guidelines series on the topic of Mechanical Integrity, to provide practitioners a basic familiarity of mechanical integrity concepts and best practices.

This book could be used by anyone involved in the design, implementation and management of mechanical integrity programs andprovides advice for developing an MI program.

MI is the programmatic implementation of activities necessary to ensure that important equipment will be functional and available throughout the life of an operation. MI programs vary according to industry, regulatory requirements, geography, and plant culture. However, some characteristics are common to all good MI programs. For example, a successful MI program:

• Includes activities to ensure that equipment is designed, fabricated, procured, installed, operated, and maintained in a manner appropriate for its intended application
• Clearly designates equipment within the program based on defined criteria and documents the decisions
• Prioritizes equipment to help optimally allocate resources (e.g., personnel, money, storage space)
• Helps a plant staff perform planned maintenance and reduce the need for unplanned maintenance
• Helps a plant staff recognize when equipment deficiencies occur and includes controls to help ensure that equipment deficiencies do not lead to serious accidents
• Incorporates recognized and generally accepted good engineering practices (RAGAGEPs)
• Helps ensure that personnel assigned to inspect/test/maintain/procure/ fabricate/install/decommission/recommission process equipment are appropriately trained and have access to appropriate procedures for these activities
• Maintains service documentation and other records to enable consistent performance of MI activities and to provide accurate equipment information to other users, including other process safety and risk management elements

This book provides advice for developing an MI program with all of these characteristics