CDOIF Guidance

CDOIF

Chemical and Downstream Oil

Industries Forum

CDOIF is a collaborative venture formed to agree strategic areas for

joint industry / trade union / regulator action aimed at delivering

health, safety and environmental improvements with cross-sector

benefits.

Guideline – Demonstrating Prior Use v4

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applications. Therefore, consideration of the performance of such devices in non-safety

applications may be included in the overall volume of operating experience.

4.4

Volume of the operating experience

It is expected that, if the component is to be utilised as prior use, it will have had

significant and reliable service in equivalent (or near equivalent) operations. The

following data should be available in order for the end user to make this assessment:

•

The end-user needs to confirm that the component is on their list of approved

equipment

•

Component reliability records (refer to the guidance provided in EEMUA 222 and

HSE SPC 48 for further information relating to component reliability records)

•

The number of years that the component has been used in equivalent (or near

equivalent) applications at a facility

•

The process and environmental conditions that the component has been used at

a facility

•

The different applications that the component has been used at a facility, where

this is relevant to the prior use assessment

•

Whether the component has been used at other of the user’s facilities

•

Records of any modifications that have been necessary on the component

•

Records of any failures

In order to control which components are used in safety applications, the end user

should create an approved or recommended vendor document from which to select

components. This document should detail all the different types of components along

with the manufacturers and vendors from whom those products may be sourced. If

there are any restrictions in terms of operating location or service, then this should

also be identified within the document. This document should be updated frequently

based upon the successful operating experience of components. Components that

have had a history of poor reliability should be removed from the list in preference for

more reliable devices

There should be a reliable system in place to detect and record failures to ensure

confidence in the failure records. Failures should be readily categorised in terms of

safe/dangerous, revealed/unrevealed, the failure type and cause. All failures should

be recorded consistently (refer also to Appendix A).

Note: For field devices

, information relating to operating experience is to be recorded in

the user’s list of equipment approved for use in their facilities, and based on an extensive

history of successful performance in safety and non-safety applications. The list of field

devices may be used to support claims of experience in operation, provided that

Sensors, valves and other devices that are located on the process.