Procedural Automation

The Challenge

Startups, shutdowns, and other major transitions can be stressful periods for an operator. Standard operating procedures (SOPs) walk the operator through these events, but they can be challenging to follow: they are sometimes written down and not always available at the operator's finger tips. It can be easy to lose place and skip critical steps for long and complicated procedures and are often out of date.

These complications can have profound financial impacts: delayed production, equipment damage, or off-spec product. A single event can cause upwards of millions of dollars in unrecoverable profit loss.

The Solution

Our team at Spartan has developed a unique set of work processes to effectively transform outdated SOPs into a guided, semi-automated process that is built into the graphics that the operator is already using.

These semi-automated procedures guide operators through the common but critical SOP steps, automating actions where reasonable and prompting operator actions when not. Our solution also provides an avenue for veteran operators to log their suggestions facilitating a quick and easy way to keep SOPs up to date.