Episode 16 - Fell in Love with Materials Engineering (featuring Bill Valerioti)

We have a deep dive into materials engineering and corrosion this time around! 

In part 1 of our interview, we welcome Bill Valerioti, a semi-retired petrochemicals and chemical industry SME. From his early days in chemical engineering to finding his passion for materials engineering and corrosion – Bill shares insight into his passion for materials failure analysis, mechanical integrity, and chemical plant operations. Bill also emphasizes the importance of effective communication, mentorship, understanding process operations, and continuous learning in the field. His contributions have spanned various roles, including materials engineer, maintenance superintendent, and operations superintendent, offering a comprehensive view of the industry's evolution and challenges.

If you work in mechanical integrity or engineering, this episode is a must-listen. Part 2 of our conversation with Bill Valerioti will be published on November 13 – subscribe today!

01:12 Bill Val's Educational Journey

02:09 Early Career and Internship Experience

03:18 Professional Growth at Phillips Petroleum

05:10 Transition to Equipment Inspection

08:39 Lessons from Mentorship and Operations

15:07 Importance of Communication and Soft Skills

23:32 Technical Insights and Industry Evolution

29:10 Encouragement for Continuous Learning

35:26 Building Trust and Relationships in Operations

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Episode Acronyms & Abbreviations

API – American Petroleum Institute 

DMR – Damage Mechanism Review

HTHA – High-Temperature Hydrogen Attack

MPC – Materials Properties Council (subsidiary of the WRC)

NACE – National Association of Corrosion Engineers, now known as AMPP (Association for Materials Protection & Performance)  

NDE – Non-destructive Evaluation 

NDT – Non-destructive Testing 

NPC – National Petroleum Council

RBI – Risk-Based Inspection

WRC – Welding Research Council

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Join us next time, wherever you get your podcasts. Until then, stay safe and stay informed.

Note:  The views and opinions expressed by the guest are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the hosts or the Upon Further Inspection podcast. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or professional advice. Listeners should seek their own qualified advisors for guidance.

Transcript

Branden 0:00

Well, welcome back. we have with us today, semi-retired petrochemicals and chemical industry, SME Bill Valdi, also affectionately known as Bill Val. so Bill, welcome to the show today. Thanks for coming.

Bill 0:31

Thank you, Brandon. My pleasure. Thank you for having on as, as your guest today. I look forward to a good conversation today with you all.

Branden 0:39

we talked a little bit, just as we were kind of getting set up here, and, I know you've got a little bit of background and experience here in the, the mechanical integrity industry. can you just give our, our listeners a picture into kind of where you're an SME, how you're an SME, where you came from a little bit, and touch on a couple of those key points.

Greg 0:58

how you started Bill, and the only other thing I mentioned for our listeners here is he's got experience in the refining, industry as well. But Bill, we'll get to that. Go ahead Bill. Sorry.

Bill 1:09

Yeah. I appreciate it. Yeah, thank you. good question. it really started with my, college education, I, uh, grew up in Florida and, decided, late after, you know, in the senior year to attend the University of Florida as good at science and math. And so engineering seemed to be a natural fit. started out in chemical engineering, but it just wasn't clicking. I wasn't motivated. It, it didn't, sink in with me. And so I took a year off. I took a year off and worked some construction jobs as an electrician's helper. And then, I realized I wasn't passionate about that as kids say today. So I, I found my way back to school and took an Intro to materials class, which was on the schedule for your third year of college. And I just fell in love with materials engineering and corrosion. So that's how I really. Became learned in materials and, the properties and corrosion and failure analysis through courses at the University of Florida. And as luck would have it, one of the professors there, professor Emeritus at the University of Florida, a a Dr. Ferrin was active in nace. And if. If you're familiar with nace, now known as amp, he's written a lot of publications about engineering, economy and design for corrosion control. And, really a great, great person, a great human being. And, he, he was an acquaintance, with a, a fellow at Phillips Petroleum in the materials lab, RC Bob Schuler. And they were both involved in nace. And, and Bob put some feelers out, you know, at the conference that they were looking for a summer intern. And lo and behold, Elis Vink recommended, me to go out and, take that position as a summer intern. And I asked myself years later, how did I impress upon him that he would recommend me for that job? I wasn't top of the class. you know, I was a, a good, solid BB plus student, you know, close, but no cigar a lot of times. but I really think it was because I came prepared to his class. I, as I said, it was a corrosion engineering class. I loved it so much that I used to read ahead and I was able to answer a lot of questions and, So that's how I got hooked up with Phillips Petroleum Company in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, in the materials engineering lab. And this is, in 1981. So it, it really was a phenomenal experience. And then, working in the failures, analysis lab. most of the staff there were in their fifties and sixties, you know, there was a big, big age gap due to the cyclical nature of, petroleum exploration, production, refining. And so there was large gaps in hiring. So that's how I got into it. I learned a lot. Supporting the plants. We had assignments, of course, material support assignments for our manufacturing facilities, primarily in Borger, in Sweeney, Texas, and, Adams terminal, now known as Pasadena Plastics and Houston. And each materials engineer had an area of responsibility, both a facility but also a process. And, and some of my processes that I was responsible for were the sulfur units, the Klaus units, the HF Alkylation. As many people know, Phillips Petroleum was a, a licenser of that technology before they sold it to UOP. so I supported that. And the high temperature business, so crude furnaces and ethylene, the hot end of the ethylene furnaces. And as part of that assignment, we would put on, biannual equipment inspection conferences, right? Internal training, knowledge transfer sessions, folks, you know, put together some papers and learnings and we'd would bring primarily the equipment, inspectors, the company inspectors in and, and share technology with them. And knowledge and information. And, you know, I, I did that, two or three times and, you know, it's about 19 91, 92 and, And I, I made a presentation and, and in the audience was the, eh, h and s manager from, Adams terminal, Pasadena Plastics. And they had a, equipment inspection program. It was really, really young. It really wasn't functioning at the level, it could have been. And so he, he approached me and approached my boss with an opportunity to transfer, to the, Eastern Chemical Complex, Adams terminal, and, really take over and lead the, equipment inspection group. And so that really, you know, so you have a background in materials failure analysis, support, communicating, teaching, transferring knowledge, and now you get to, to get the, your boots on the ground where the rubber meets the road. And, you know, you know, okay, big dog, you've been telling us about how to do things better. Well now we're gonna see if you can really, drive, change and implement, you know, an improvement in the program that we have here in Houston. And I, I wanted that opportunity. I, I really. Was raised, as we said earlier, Greg, to to be as a, a, a problem solver to figure things out. my dad and mom always, emphasized education. My dad was Mr. Fix It. He, he was a phenomenal, person and an electro mechanical draftsman designer who had a garage full of hardware, disassembled lawnmowers. He had, models of, upright scooters. He turned roller skates into one of the first scooters and had patents. So he was always tinkering. And I, I just was awed by that and, and I was kind of a blue collar guy and always felt comfortable in the environment, in the scale of a petrochemical complex. It really made an impression upon me, and so I wanted to work in that environment. And one of the other things that really drove me was. You know, I felt I was spending a lot of time becoming good at analyzing failures and understanding, you know, why and how things failed and, and what we could do to improve the situation. And of course, I learned a lot by leaning on inspection personnel because as many of you know, you know, when, when failed components get shipped off, it's usually the equipment inspection group that is, is tasked or voluntold to, to send that to the Met Lab, you know, and get it analyzed. So that's your primary contact. You'll learn a lot from those folks. And so that was really, you know, my introduction to, I, I would say, you know, fixed equipment inspection, mechanical integrity, because now it's you. It's 92, 93, the OSHA regulation is promulgated now nineteen ten one one nine J. And so we're immersed in that and understanding that, and now we really have, you know, the terminology mechanical integrity. So I, I would say that's how I, I came about, you know, entering the field, the industry, the profession, and, really have never looked back, have been involved with it really ever since, directly and indirectly.

Greg 8:38

Well bill your time. If I could add your time in Bartlesville, early part of your career, how can you say something about how important that experience being around a failure analysis lab and then having. Maybe some excellent mentors around you. You know, we don't have time for mentoring much more these days. How much did you learn from that experience?

Bill 9:00

It, it was, it was amazing and incredible. there were, you know, a large room, you know, in the days when everyone was in a large room with desks and chairs, literally separated by, by an arm's reach. You know, when the materials engineers, the, the painting coating guys, the cists, the ceramics, the welding engineers were in there. and you had, you know, a tremendous exchange of information and mentoring because you would seek knowledge and input from others, not only about the. You know, the, the component that was submitted, but the process because, for someone with a mechanical background and trained in materials engineering and corrosion and corrosion prevention, you need to know about the process. I, I can't emphasize enough how important it is to understand the process chemistry and then the actual operation both the written operating. Instructions and procedures, but also trying to sit and visit with operators and really understand that and I was able to do that and learn that, not only from my time in the materials engineering laboratory, where we shared so much information and knowledge, but later on when I assumed the position took the, over the position in Houston, now I had access directly to operators. And one of the things that used to, I felt hold us back in, in the, was. the operator would not get on the phone. It, it was unheard of that you could get a unit operator, you know, to answer some cat questions, long distance, you know, it was, it was a secondary or tertiary kind of exchange for the equipment inspector on site to maybe go back and get some more information. So I really learned so much from so many people and I actually made a list of people who I learned a lot from, and it's a list of some 50 people. Wow. And it spans the backgrounds of operators, fixed equipment in inspection personnel, both contract and company. I've learned a lot from, maintenance people. I haven't mentioned it yet, but, after my time, three years with the fixed equipment inspection group, I was given the opportunity to lead the mechanical engineering group for a polypropylene unit. And then, I became the polypropylene, maintenance superintendent. Where I, I, I learned a tremendous amount of information, spent a lot of time in the maintenance shops in the p and t with the pump and turbine mechanics with scheduling and planning, and I learned the importance of scheduling and planning and maintenance and, and pre-staging jobs and getting all the right information and coordinating with operations. So I would leave, this piece of advice with, mechanical integrity, fixed equipment analysts. Inspection personnel. look for opportunities to expand your base by, making an impression, by solving problems, by owning problems and solutions. If you bring a problem, bring a proposed solution. that's what middle management and upper management is looking for. People that are willing. To take ownership and drive solutions and, coordinate and motivate people to impart positive change. So just like I asked myself and I mentioned earlier, well, why did the professor at the University of Florida recommend me for that position? Because I was out there with, uh, solutions and answers that were. Based on the information I learned from the textbook. but that the other opportunities that opened up for me in Houston at the manufacturing facility, it was because I was willing to get past the, this is wrong. That's wrong. To finally turn the page on that and get to a solution and not only propose what the solutions could be, but to take ownership and say, we'll implement it, you know, we'll, we'll follow this and we'll get this implemented and we'll take ownership of that. And I think if you, you wanna know what middle managers and what catches someone's eye. It's the people that are willing to put their time and their knowledge and their decision making and their collaboration on the line and, and implement positive change. And get things done in a manufacturing facility. And with those opportunities, as I mentioned, as a mechanical lead, as the, maintenance superintendent, and ultimately I became the operations superintendent of a polyethylene unit. And if you think about it, there, there's so many different, you know, perspectives now. You know, I, I started in the materials lab when I was seeking knowledge and information from those various entities, right? Maintenance. How did maintenance influence, what were the maintenance procedures? What preventative maintenance? what did we do? What did we not do? How was it operated? In here in 12 years, from 1981 to 1993. I find myself now in some of those roles and learning, on the other side of the fence. And I brought my original perspective and knowledge with me and I got a really good appreciation. So, and again, I think I had those opportunities because I was a change agent. I was willing to dig for not only the root cause of issues, and, but later on, you know, drive some of those solutions so that, that would be a piece of advice to people. the other thing I learned, from the school of hard knocks was, you know, when you start out in the corporate engineering world, and, and you start to emerge as a, an expert, you have to be careful. It, it isn't just about reporting the facts, it's how the facts are reported and, and to give due consideration of, other perspectives and, and other constraints, whether they be business straints, operating constraints, limits, challenges in the budgetary area. And so what I learned of after some rough, rough patches was I needed to be more considerate and, and have a broader perspective. It, it wasn't just about this is why it failed and this is what we need to do and how to prevent it. Well, maybe we couldn't do that right now. We couldn't do that right now because of the turnaround schedule. Parts are not available. And so I learned that to be careful and consider, others' perspectives and to choose my words carefully, especially my written words, but also my verbal communications. You know, you, you think a lot of times the equipment inspection or MI group is, it goes back and forth over the years from, from the safety group process safety, safety, h and s to maintenance, to technical. And when it, when it tends to reside in safety, you, you feel that, you know, you're, you represent, you know, the personnel safety and process safety. So we're gonna do this and you have to do this, and this is the way, it is, well, you quickly learn that that may be the case. But you know, we have to get from point A to point B after diverting to a midpoint, you know, and maybe monitoring or managing, a situation because we're not able at, at this particular time to implement. So those were some learnings along the way. Don't overlook the importance of verbal communications considering, people's, positions, perspectives, the politics of it, for lack of a better word. and to be positive and, and willing to adjust and moderate and find, you know, manageable solutions to what you think is a black and white issue, because it, it may not be that way. right now.

Branden 17:41

I understand that concept actually. I, I talk about, With Greg, I've talked about this here at home. I talk about there's old Brandon and there's New Brandon and, new Brandon is ever since I've gotten married, old Brandon was before that. and old Brandon did not understand the concept of, I'll call it bedside manner, right? Doctors, I don't know if you've ever had a doctor with very poor bedside manner. I fell into that a little bit. I was a bit crass. And, so I definitely understand the point of like making sure that you see all the perspectives, you understand everybody's side and that you. Try to utilize, even just the tone in which you, Give, you can say the same sentence two different ways, and it comes off very, very different. I'm learning that now with my daughter who's five, and I am seeing myself come out in her and I'm like, Ooh, okay. We need to make some changes in, in a couple of things there. So I, I can definitely relate to that for sure. Yeah,

Bill 18:34

absolutely. Absolutely. Right. And another layer to that is body language and facial expressions. You know, I had a tendency, if I'm hearing something I don't think is quite right or maybe a, a little light on the facts and technical support, you know, my face would express that. you need to contain that and be stone faced sometimes, or have a poker face, I mean, Really impactful learning I had was, totally blindsided. it was about 1991, and, and this is going back to when I was in materials lab and we, we had a refining ARD unit, an atmospheric residual desulfurization unit, and we had some temperature excursions, some reactions due to maldistribution flow. They culminated in some elevated temperatures at the reactor outlet. and there was some doubt about the, integrity and the reliability and the truthfulness of some, ti some temperature indication devices. And the operators didn't quite believe it. Well, they, they should have believed it'cause they were real. The bottom line is we had a, a over temp, we had a rupture. We had a breach of pressure boundary. We had a release, we had a fire, and, and, you know, all hell breaking loose. So there was two reactors. the reactor that had the incident and the nearby reactor that needed to have a damage, assessment. You know, a fire damage assessment. And we brought in, DNV for that, and they, they helped us with that. We had company experts, we had a lot of support. And I was the, the company liaison And, well, you know, we, we were looking at the microstructure structure. Of course, the arts, reactors were some 11 and three quarter inches thick, two and a quarter of one Molly, temperate steel. Big, big single forged rings that were welded together. They were, in the 1980s, late eighties. They can only be manufactured by companies like JSW, you know, Japan steelworks and some companies in Europe. And so these had to be shipped. And, so the lead time was incredible, as you can imagine. And of course, as you know, if you've ever experienced fire damage, you have the technical people coming in doing the fire damage assessment and, the evaluations. But you also have project people that are rich and they get going on the rebuild and they're pushing hard and they have to pull some levers and strings. Well, bottom line to cut to the chase is from the cord samples where we literally had a, what I'll call a, a carbide hole, saw a diamond hole cutting saw. We cord, you know, three samples of affected areas on, on the primary affected, reactor involved in an incident, and the fire exposure to the nearby reactor. And it turned out that the reactor that had the release truly was the heat treatment was adversely affected. and there was a mixed mode, microstructure in there. It wasn't a tempered Martin acidic band structure and, you know, the, the properties were compromised. but on the, the adjacent reactor, there wasn't any, measurable, visual evidence or, or physical hardness testing impact and tensile testing degradation of the properties. So, you know, we went in and, and had a big meeting at the refinery with corporate engineering corporate reps. And, you know, we reported the results and made the recommendation that we as a company only need to replace and order one reactor. And this was said in front of the Refining manager, the manager of corporate engineering. Well, unbeknownst to me, and maybe. I should have known, or my manager should have known, we probably should have sat down with, you know, the corporate engineering manager and discussed some of our findings because they had hedged their bets and they ordered two replacement reactors and they had to put up non-refundable money.

Greg 22:27

Oh man.

Bill 22:28

And, and it's almost as if. at that point politically for my career and for corporate engineering, saving face in front of the refinery manager, I should have jawboned a little bit and said, you know, it's probably best that we replaced both reactors. So, now that's pretty far stretched in terms of the implications, but, don't, don't overlook the parties at the table and who signs your paycheck. And, it isn't always just the facts. Now, having known that I, don't know, I, I would not have. Reported any different results, but I would've put in some, sweet words about, you know, why we understand it makes sense that we do this due to delivery and scheduling purposes. You know, you had to get it on order. Right,

Greg 23:17

right.

Bill 23:18

I mean, I don't recall how long the materials evaluation went on, but it probably was four or five weeks and, you know, time was of the essence. So

Greg 23:27

Bill, how thick were those reactors again?

Bill 23:29

They were 11 and three quarter inches thick, as I recall. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. And they, they were really the first, I don't know the first literally, but this is when we, we implemented J Factor, you know, control, to manage and mitigate temper and brittle man. Right. We were tightly controlling the phosphorus, the sulfur, the antimony, the tin, the grain structure, and of course. You're interested in a, a tempered martin side, upper bay knife structure because you, you want the properties, you want the strength in those reactors, so they don't need to be 14 inches thick. Right. And, and to get'em to be 11 and three quarter inches, you know, you want mechanical properties and so they need to be a tempered Martin site. But that's when the industry was seeing the loss in, Sharpie V notch impact testing, results. When you had the older grades of two and a quarter Chrome when Molly, that hadn't, had. J factor and controlling the weld, chemistry. and, and so, you know, we, we were able to do that testing.

Greg 24:41

isn't that amazing, bill? could you, say a word about, I mean, when I go back and look, and my background is chemistry, not metallurgy, but when I'd look at some of the stuff, I, I'd go back and see some of the work that the Materials Properties Council had done. Yeah. That, yeah, the Welding Research Council, WRC and MPC and even going back to Case Western and a lot of their original work that they did there. Right. Yeah. And guided you Bens and other stuff. How important is it that the industry, maintain those types of records and technical basis to maybe try to understand how we got to where we are in our understanding of materials, properties and the different things like J factors and so forth, flow stress now that we're using and other stuff?

Bill 25:24

Yeah, I think it's incredibly important and I'm glad you bring that up. I'm old school in that regard. I've learned a combination of. Textbook Knowledge, mentors, formal education on the job, training, tremendously important. Listening to people. you can learn from everyone and everybody, so take time to listen to them. But in terms of the research, the testing that happens that takes place through various entities the Bell Patel Memorial Institute is another one. EWI, yes. NPC, incredible work. University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge, NACE and, and others. I, I think it's important to understand where we've been, and, What the challenges were in the fifties and the sixties and the experiences we'd had with brittle failure. You know, the liberty ships, you know, the welded construction that was being used to produce World War II vessels, the steel quality at the time, the temperatures of the vessels in the ocean and the harbors, and how the failures were happening at stress razors at t junctions, and how the testing revealed that steels that had impact testing values, that operating, exposure temperature of, of, of less than about 10 foot pounds were the ones that were experiencing brittle fracture. And some people say that's where the first value of 15 foot pounds, Sharpie V notch came from because the testing revealed that brittle fractures were happening. If the steel, test temperatures. Say 30 45. Were failing at, you know, less than 10 foot pounds. They didn't see if they had, so they added a safety factor of 50% and said, let's make the value required 15 foot pounds. I maintain and still have textbooks from the fifties, sixties, some A SME, handbooks on pressure vessels and materials engineering, you know, old code books old A SME section. section two, code books. I, I think it is important to understand where the industry has been and I, I'd say we're doing a good job of doing the fundamental testing and research and study. We did that with temper and embrittlement. We've done that with stress, corrosion cracking. We have done that and continue to do that with high temperature hydrogen attack. the learnings continue. we're getting more knowledgeable and learned and, and our, ability to evaluate and predict. There's volumetric models now, crack growth fissure, joining diffusion models. It's incredible with some very knowledgeable people have been able to, to, educate us on through. WRC bulletins is really is a nice place to start to introduce the industry and, and garner, acceptance and understanding. And, even now in NDE, you know, what is the best NDT technique, time of flight, diffraction, you know, phased array analysis. background scatter. we've learned a lot there and we've advanced and, and those learnings are now have been incorporated. And the other one, we're, we continue to learn about is stress, relaxation, cracking, right? The damage mechanism that affects otic stainless deals, nickel base alloys, some iron nickel base alloys, and the phenomena that happens, really what, five 50 C to seven 50 c and to, to control that and manage that. so it, it really is important. So I would encourage people. always learn, always continue to learn. the more knowledge and understanding you have, I think you can be more effective in expressing and identifying and preventing. and there's tremendous, learning sources today. The internet is incredible. The amount of, information you can accumulate and acquire, inspection Hearing Journal is on my top five list of places to go for information and knowledge because of the authors that, that you all have assembled and that the people that are willing to write. my hats off to those people. the John Reynolds of the world, you, you know, Heinz Block, he used to write. Tremendous articles for hydrocarbon processing reliability. John Reynolds, what, what he's done for the industry through API through technical presentations, conferences. a book I kept with, close to me and still have is 101 Elements, essential Elements in a Pressure Equipment integrity management program. I mean, that that book was, dogeared and, and feathered edge because I was into it so much. And that book and the information he conveyed, just made such a huge impact. On me and ultimately was the source of probably a half dozen to a dozen special emphasis programs with the companies I've worked with because they were areas we weren't performing very well. So I know I've been all over the place. the question was, you know, the technical content. How important is it that we keep a record? we access those records. We try to understand, we reach out. it's essential to keep moving forward. You know, one of the false impressions, I think, to broach another topic about our industry. and chemical plants are viewed as, oh yeah. Old and nasty and they've been there for years and there's probably not a lot of exciting things in technology going on, you know, in those facilities they're probably producing. And it, it couldn't be further from the truth, not only in, in the processes, in the process controls, the process, monitoring the use of, AI to judge how the process is performing, where the process needs to go, data acquisition, deciphering the learnings from data, the knowledge we have about materials and corrosion and damage mechanisms and tools to improve the situation, to gain a better understanding, to monitor, to assess it. It's just been a phenomenal. Industry from my perspective and how far it is advanced and how it relies on state-of-the-art knowledge and technology to continue to improve. So I would say to people, Young people, at some universities. There's some really good, junior colleges. I, I think of San Jacinto College. I think, Lee College. I think they're doing a great job in the area of prospect technology, non-destructive testing, fixed equipment testing. I think there's a lot of ways to acquire and obtain information and for me. I've learned so much, from books. I know I met John Reynolds once at the podium at A-A-A-P-I Equipment Inspection Conference. I don't expect him to even remember who I am. It doesn't matter, but I feel I've learned so much from him, Heinz Block, as I said, John Riddle. and some of the authors today that, are prolific writers and I respect people that, are good writers and, and, and write well. I don't count myself as one of those. And I, I'd say again, if I have to ramble a little bit and pass on a piece of advice, become versed at verbal communications and presenting right PowerPoint presentations. Don't underestimate the value in being a good presenter and take those opportunities. You know, don't, don't always look to pass them to someone else to make a presentation. if they're gonna give a presentation on what the fixed equipment inspection analyst has learned or believed to ask the, the person who may be presenting that. If you can do that section and become positive and comfortable in that environment, it can only help you in your career and your profession. If you're a good communicator, you write good emails, you know, I would've benefited by AI today. I mean, you, you can get AI. some of the free ones to help you draft and craft some, some language. Now be clever enough to leave out the words that are above what you would normally use and your correspondence. But, I mean, there there's just a lot of good people that are willing to take the time to write articles and they really serve the industry well and I respect them and my hats off to those people.

Greg 34:35

So, bill, you went over some soft skill stuff here. that's really important. I know it's important, like when you make a recommendation to, do all your homework, to understand the dynamics behind the scenes Yeah. As to kind of what's going on. and I think communications are key. in fact, you may get a kick out of this, I've been doing RBI since the late, mid nineties and one of the people that I always wanna make sure when I'm doing a validation. whether it's a DMR or mechanical information or whatever, but especially the, the process information is make sure the chief panel operator is in there,'cause that's the guy or girl that knows what's going on in the middle of the night when nobody's looking. they typically are more knowledgeable than the process engineer when it comes to day-to-day operations and what's happening. So can you speak to that a little bit about,'cause you did a little bit earlier about operators and how important it is to get good communications going with those guys.

Bill 35:37

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Greg, that's an important point and I, I applaud you for recognizing the importance of having a chief operator, the board, the lead operator of a process unit involved. it's essential. I, I would say it's essential my three and a half years in operations, where I was responsible, and leaned heavily on operators and process chemists and technologists of those units. But what you learn about is. how they manage and, work the unit, and juggle many things in the unit that aren't optimized at any particular time. Right. So it isn't that you learn things devious or clandestine things that you know Right. They're trying to put over.

Branden 36:29

Yeah.

Bill 36:29

It's just the real world of, you know, the feedstock quality and, where the treater bed, where the aluminum bed is performing is the Illumina fracture? Is the miv been over tempt and it is not removing the impurities water, oxygen, CO2, chlorides, whatever the impurities are, and how they have to manage it and how they tell how the unit and. Process is behaving, which valves, may leak through how the temperature comes up when they bring the unit online. If they have water boots, you know, how, how rigorous are they about, you know, tapping and, and draining off, you know, liquids from a decanter or, you know, a drum. is it done manually or they rigorous about that? or, or is, an automatic, semi-automatic level control system that that dumps, you know, on level detection? it is important. if you're not communicating or seeking to learn from someone who has a firsthand knowledge of operating, you're probably not doing any better than 65, 70 percentile in terms of the, the knowledge, the potential knowledge that you could have in the knowledge that you're leaving on the table. So if you're having difficulty and get that, getting that information, then you need to collaborate and work the phones, work the email, pay a visit, buy some lunches, establish'em, trust and confidence. here's a, a way to do that. It's simpler than, you might think. You go to the control room as a fixed equipment inspection analyst, as an inspector, as a maintenance superintendent, or corporate materials engineer. And you talk to the operators and you ask'em what problems they're having and what problems. I, I have a list, I have some time. I may be able to help you guys or ladies solve some problems. and that's how you, you build rapport. And in my case, I gained a lot of trust and confidence with operators. As an operating superintendent, it was about a walkway. They wanted a walkway, a platform, and a walkway from one section of the plant over to the pellet, the polymer pellet tanks. Because without a platform, because the original structure had a man lifter elevator up to the fifth, sixth level. Wow. Right. And so with a walkway, then they could get over to the top of the tanks and they'd have to bang on the tanks and do a physical verification of the level inside the solid handling tanks. Before we had a walkway over to the top of those tanks, they'd have to go down to the ground floor and literally walk up, you know, old fashioned staircases. And they had a, they were supposed to check the level two times a day. And so I took on that. Under the guise of a safety program, personnel safety, wear and tear on your joints. And I got the budget and got that implemented. Okay. So that's how you get a list of 10 things they wanna see done, you be honest about, we can't get all of these done, but whether you're in maintenance or engineering or inspection, ask what operators, what difficulties they're having operating what valves, what's problematic, and try to influence an improvement for them in that area. And that's, that's a great way to gain, trust earn or friendship. I'd say the other way is. And this seems so obvious, but you know, when you're pressed for time, you have to learn some things from the school of hard knocks. So this is again, about trust and delivering on promises. One of the activities back in the early nineties that operators were responsible for was the fire extinguisher inspection checklist. Right? You, you, in a unit, you, you all know it, you have, fire extinguishers positioned in the unit. And, those need to be inspected, monthly, as I recall. You know, you had to look for corrosion, you had to look at the gauge, the pressure, the hose, you know, evaluated, assess it. And of course we had a, a check sheet for that. And, and so every month they'd go out and, and do that and turn in the reports to the operation supervisor who'd ultimately turn it in, the superintendent and the superintendent at the time. It's not the case anymore that the superintendent is responsible, you know, to get a replacement extinction, get service, implemented. But it was at the time and. at first, when I first took over the job, you know, I was drinking from a fire hose. I'm a mechanical materials person now in operations. So, you know, that was a, a outta my comfort zone, but I wasn't giving enough priority to resolving the fire extinguisher issues. So after probably two or three months of the operators saying that they were reporting the same issues and they weren't getting done, guess what happened to the quality of the surveys, of the fire extinguishers and, and the reliability? Probably said, look, if it's not important to that fellow to get it done, yeah, why should I take the time and give a good effort? So, you know, I initially got frustrated and, you know, probably was headed down to the control room on my bike to call someone out on that. But I had enough sense to realize that I was the problem So, everything matters e every board, every relationship. But there's, there's ways to, garner trust and those associations that will make a difference. And having a good relationship with operations and maintenance is important in a manufacturing facility in the petrochemical or refining industry.

Branden 42:29

bill, I want to thank you so much for your time joining us today. You're welcome. this has been awesome. Thank you for listening to Upon Further Inspection, a Mechanical Integrity podcast. This episode was co-created by Inspectioneering, and CorrSolutions. Our producers are Nick Schmoyer, Jocelyn Christie and Jeremiah Wooten. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or professional's advice. Listeners should seek their own qualified advisors for guidance. If you enjoyed this episode. Please join us next time wherever you listen to your podcasts. Until then, stay safe and stay informed.