ISO 50001 for the Petroleum Industry – A Basis for Partnership Between Operating Companies and EPC Contractors for Successful Implementation

Abstract

Many Operating Companies (OPCOs) in the Middle-East petroleum industry are adopting the ISO 50001 standard for Energy Management. EPC Companies (EPCs) would be the ideal partner for the OPCOs to ensure energy management system requirements are implemented right from the design and construction stage of the facilities.Requirements for energy efficiency in design should be included from the FEED stage to ensure minimum schedule impact during the EPC stage. Provisions in contracts would ensure EPCs understand and take responsibility for achieving the target energy efficiency in the design. Other methods, such as performing energy audits, right sizing, settings for optimum energy efficient plant operations, measurement, monitoring and trending, etc., are other ways by which EPCs could further contribute towards attaining the objective of the OPCOs. All energy users considered in the energy management programme, such as compressed air usage, water consumption, waste generation, etc. could be optimized by the EPCs. It is important to get the design specifications for energy efficient systems implemented during the design and construction phase to reap maximum benefits from the energy efficient measures.This paper could be used as a basic foundation for the OPCOs and the EPCs to work towards a comprehensive strategy to deliver projects with energy management requirements being included inherently in the design and construction phases of the project.