Too much of a good thing?-alarm management experience in BP Oil. 1. Generic problems with DCS alarm systems

This paper brings together BP´s current views on what constitutes an effective DCS alarm system, and the barriers that must be overcome before the alarm system can make a full contribution to supporting the tasks of the process operator. A summary is presented of the role of the alarm system within the operator interface, together with definitions of typical event-driven information. The generic problems that prevent alarm systems from being effective are reviewed, including practical and fundamental limitations, poor implementation and misuse of the available alarm features. The typical symptoms of poor alarm systems (alarm flood, standing alarms etc.) are described, and a number of tools and techniques are listed which have been used by BP to bring about improvements. This paper draws heavily from work carried out on a range of BP sites, and from the work of the ASM Consortium