There is more to commissioning and startup of an industrial plant than the detailed testing of each piece of equipment.  An entire commissioning program requires a project management approach to properly plan and execute all stages of commissioning.  Commissioning is a critical stage of the project lifecycle.  But when you review common project literature, commissioning is not covered in depth.  This may be one of the reasons why commissioning is often an afterthought on many projects – the commissioning team is only engaged at the end of the project to try to make the equipment work.  But doing this will not deliver the project on-time or on-budget.  Commissioning needs to be integrated into all stages of the project with a project management approach to ensure that each step of detailed testing is successful.

Schedule Management

The project schedule is the commissioning team’s most powerful tool to define priorities and explain the impacts of delays to the rest of the project team.  The most important milestone on the project is the in-service date, and it is the commissioning team’s responsibility to meet this date at the end of the project.  This is only possible though if all other groups that precede commissioning deliver their portion of the project when needed to support the commissioning sequence.  Delays during the design phase can have follow-on impacts to construction and commissioning.  Installation and mechanical completions that are out of sequence or delayed will significantly impact system commissioning.  There are a significant number of small details and deliverables needed at the right time in order that all parts of the project are available when needed to bring the new facilities online.

The commissioning schedule needs to be developed early in the project in order to convey priorities to the project team.  If the commissioning schedule is not developed until later in the project when the commissioning team mobilizes to the site, the sequence of activities during design, procurement, IFAT, and construction can be completely misaligned.  Without an understanding of how the project must come together at the end to meet the in-service date, it is not possible to plan all preceding activities to ensure this is the case.

This is one of the main reasons to have the commissioning team involved at the beginning of the project during Front End Engineering & Design (FEED).  The commissioning team can work with the design team to establish the overall commissioning sequence to meet the project in-service date.  This in turn provides guidance to the design team for when design deliverables need to be available to support subsequent construction and commissioning activities.

Once developed, it is important for the commissioning team to continually evaluate the commissioning schedule and assess the impacts of any changes.  Despite everyone’s best intentions, there will still be delays that occur.  Some of these delays are within the project team’s ability to control, while others are more difficult to manage due to external factors.

• Delay of design deliverables.
• Equipment deliveries may be late arriving at the site due to vendor-caused delays.
• Equipment may be damaged during shipping or installation.
• Systems may fail during testing due to infant mortality.
• Systems may be damaged during testing due to incorrect test methods.
• Plus many more.

While these delays may occur, most have some method to mitigate their chance of occurrence, and all should have a contingency plan should they occur.  More on this later when risk management is discussed.

During commissioning, it is important for the commissioning team to assess the schedule and provide regular updates to all stakeholders.  Everyone will have a keen interest in how commissioning is progressing, and the correct level of schedule information needs to be conveyed to others so they have a clear understanding of the status of commissioning.

Cost Management

The cost of commissioning is not a significant part of the project budget.  Commissioning costs are typically less than 5% of the overall project budget, in the range of 2% to 3%.  But the cost of delays during commissioning is massive.  This is why the commissioning phase of your project needs to be planned to precision.

The construction phase of the project is where the largest portion of the budget is spent.  There are large workforces involved, equipment deliveries arrive at the site during construction, and construction activities can take place over many years.  For this reason, the construction phase of the project gets lots of attention.  The owner is paying large progress payments each month, and this certainly gets everyone’s attention.  But the cost cannot be the only metric measured during construction.  The schedule needs to be monitored as well since delays during construction can have huge cost impacts during commissioning.

Commissioning costs consist of the following:

• Labour costs for the workforce involved in commissioning.  This team is much smaller than the construction labour force and not a significant portion of the overall project budget.
• Equipment costs for specialized test equipment.  Some of this test equipment can have a long lead time with high procurement costs.  But commissioning equipment costs are not a significant cost of the overall project budget.
• Material costs for first-fills or incidental costs to start equipment for the first time.  Again, this is not a significant cost of the overall project budget.

The cost of commissioning is not a significant portion of the project budget.

However, the cost of delays during commissioning is massive due to the lost opportunity cost and the project burn rate.

The lost opportunity cost is the value to the owner of one day of commercial service of the new facilities.  If the owner is able to generate $1M dollars during each day that the plant is in-service, then one day delay to the project in-service date costs the owner the opportunity to generate this one day of revenue.  If the project is delayed for several days, weeks, or months, these lost opportunity costs can become quite significant.  To hold the contractor accountable for these delays, liquidated damages are often included in contracts to ensure all parties are motivated to meet the in-service date.

The project burn rate is the cost of one day of the project to the owner.  At the beginning of the project, the burn rate starts out low.  There are only a few people working on the project as it gets started and resources are ramped up.  As more resources are added to the project and equipment is purchased, the project burn rate starts to increase quickly.  The owner is paying monthly progress payments to all groups involved in the project, and these monthly payments are increasing as more resources and material is invoiced each month.  In addition, the owner is incurring interest and escalation costs on top of the capital being spent to pay for the project.  The project burn rate is at its highest level at the end of the construction phase as commissioning activities are starting.  On a large project, the daily burn rate could be many millions of dollars.  I have worked on projects where the daily burn rate was over $5M dollars.  This means that each day of the project is costing the owner $5M in labour, material, interest, and escalation charges.

Each day of the project during commissioning is extremely valuable and this must be considered when making decisions on the project.  It is not appropriate to try to save $1000 if that will cause a one-day delay to the project.  The thought process needs to be that if the project in-service date can be advanced by one day, this will save the project $5M.

The project burn rate and lost opportunity costs make each day of commissioning very valuable.  And this needs to be considered early in the project as well.  If a design decision can be made that will save one or more days of commissioning, then it is in the project’s best interest to proceed with the design in this manner.  If installation activities are not completed when needed by the commissioning team, this will cause delays to the in-service date at a cost of the daily burn rate.

For these reasons, commissioning needs to be planned in advance of on-site testing so that the commissioning team is ready to perform testing activities.  All risks need to be mitigated in advance (more on this later) so that the chance of delay during commissioning is low.  Having a highly-skilled commissioning team will help mitigate delays as they will know what to look for in advance of testing and can react to issues as they occur promptly and efficiently.  If the commissioning team stumbles during on-site testing or is performing testing that is not absolutely necessary, each added day is an additional expense to the project.  The mindset needs to be that each day of testing costs $5M dollars, only the required testing needs to be performed, and any failed or repeated tests come at a significant cost.  Having said this, all testing must be completed to ensure that the systems are contract compliant and the owner is receiving a quality product.

While the cost of commissioning is low, the cost of delays during commissioning is astronomical.  All activities that precede commissioning and tests that take place during commissioning need to this keep in mind when being planned and executed.  A poorly planned and executed commissioning phase of your project can quickly cause the project costs to grow out of control. 

Communication and Stakeholder Management

Scrutiny of the project is at its peak during the commissioning phase.  All project stakeholders can see that the end of the project is getting close and want the new facilities in-service right away.  While design and construction activities may have been allowed to slip in the project schedule, no project stakeholders will tolerate a slip in the project in-service date.

This doesn’t really seem fair, does it – that design and construction groups were not held accountable for their schedule delays, but all scrutiny is on the commissioning team to ensure that commissioning activities are not delayed.  But this is the reality on projects, and is why we are part of the commissioning team – to deliver under pressure!

Just a note – to reduce the level of pressure – re-read the above section of schedule management.  The project schedule is the commissioning team’s best tool to hold previous groups accountable for their deliverables.

I have included communication management and stakeholder management together as it is critical for the commissioning team to approach these two project management functions together.  During the commissioning phase, communication management is critical to manage all stakeholder’s expectations and ensure they are getting the information they need to understand what is taking place during commissioning.  Commissioning activities will go much better if stakeholders know what to expect during commissioning, what the potential risks are, how risks will be mitigated, and what contingency plans will be enacted to maintain commissioning progress.  Regular updates to stakeholders will ensure they are aware of how testing is progressing.  Immediate updates when failed tests occur will give stakeholders comfort that all issues are being disclosed and are open for discussion.

Complete communication management during commissioning builds trust with stakeholders during this highly scrutinized stage of the project.  Without a focus on communication management, stakeholders can quickly get upset and react in ways that negatively impact the project.  Commissioning is a high-stress environment for everyone involved.  There are lots of cost and schedule pressures at all levels of the organization, and the commissioning process needs to be allowed to take place thoroughly and properly even when issues are occurring.  Proper communication management gives stakeholders a level and comfort and trust of the commissioning team that even when issues arise, the team is up to the challenge to deliver a quality product on-time. 

Risk Management

Risk management is an important aspect to consider while planning and executing the commissioning phase of your project. This is more than just preparing a risk register that is reviewed monthly.  Risk management must be part of your daily work routines and decision-making processes.  All decisions on the project must balance scope, schedule, and budget, in order to ensure that the lowest risk approach is being taken.

A risk register is typically prepared early in the project during the design phase.  The risk register includes all the known risks that can be identified on the project.  The risk register is reviewed monthly and new risks are added, existing risks are evaluated to review the impact and severity, and risks that are becoming issues are addressed.  When this is taking place early in the project, there may not be a focus on commissioning risks.  A monthly review is also not often enough to consider risks.  A monthly review may be appropriate to discuss risks with project executives, but the project team needs to be continually on a daily/hourly basis evaluating risks and establishing mitigation strategies.  Every decision made must consider the risk impacts of the potential outcome during commissioning.

Due to the project burn rate, any risks that become issues and cause delays can have huge cost impacts during commissioning.  To deliver the project on-time and on-budget, risks must be considered in order to evaluate which ones will derail your path to success and what contingencies need to be planned for should they occur.  Contingency plans must be enacted quickly during commissioning, and these need to be planned for in advance so they can be quickly implemented if things start going sideways during commissioning.

The best approach is to mitigate risks early in the project.  Unfortunately, it is too common to defer risks to later in the project, which means the poor commissioning team gets all the problems that weren’t dealt with earlier dumped on them at the end of the project.  But this is not a suitable approach to deliver the project on-time and on-budget.  Risks need to be mitigated as early as possible to avoid costly delays during commissioning.

Automation presents a significant risk to the project if not properly planned for in the project sequence.  There is a multitude of small details that need to be managed for automation systems to function correctly, and each and every detail needs to be taken care of earlier in the project so that many small details do not become one giant problem during commissioning.  This is done by establishing a properly conducted IFAT during the procurement stage of the project.  The functionality of the plant process control systems needs to be verified (both hardware and software) prior to automation cubicles arriving at site.  Skipping IFAT and only verifying the hardware in the factory is an example of deferring risk to later in the project.  Integrating the PLC logic and automation cubicles for the first time on-site is risky if the code is being designed and integrated for the first time during critical path on-site commissioning activities.  The time for debugging of the code will then need to be allocated within your commissioning schedule, and there are limited ways to mitigate problems with the logic design this late in the project.  Instead, design deliverables should be planned to be available prior to IFAT to be tested in the factory and integrated with the hardware cubicles to reduce the chance of issues during on-site testing.  This is one example of mitigating risks earlier in the project to avoid impacts during commissioning, and each decision made on the project needs to follow this same thought process.

The commissioning team needs to be involved in the early part of the project to help assess risks to commissioning and help the project team establish risk mitigation strategies to ensure commissioning is successful.  An end-to-end project through the process to start with the end in mind will ensure that decisions made through all stages of the project are mitigating risk and setting the commissioning phase of your project up for the best chance of success.

Scope Management

The scope of the project is defined at the beginning of the project.  There will invariably be changes to the scope of work as new challenges are identified.  Any changes to scope, schedule, or budget must go through the contractual change management process.

But the commissioning phase of the project is not the time to implement changes to the work.  There will be some changes that are required to correct issues.  But scope creep is a risk during commissioning and needs to be closely monitored to ensure the work is not delayed.

The commissioning phase may be the first time that on-site operators are seeing the new systems.  There are several people involved and each will have a different opinion or preference of how the systems should look and feel.  However, the commissioning phase is not the time to make these changes.  Only changes to address contractual deficiencies can be implemented, and even then, the timing of when changes are implemented needs to be evaluated.  A number of small changes can quickly become significant and this scope creep can cause delays to critical path commissioning activities.

The best way to manage scope creep during commissioning is to get early and often input from the owner and operators during earlier phases of the project.  The perfect time to get operational input to HMI screens and functionality of the system is during IFAT testing.  The IFAT setup includes all functional HMIs allowing the operators to not only view the screens but to interact and provide input of the functionality of the screens.

Any opinions or preferences that are suggested as changes during commissioning can certainly be noted but held onto for review at a later date.  These can be evaluated after the project in-service date to determine if they are justified to be implemented.

Getting input earlier in the project ensures that the project team has a buy-in of the HMI interfaces and will limit the opinions and preferences during commissioning.  The commissioning team can then focus on testing the systems and placing them in-service to meet the project ISD.

Quality Management

Commissioning is a specialized quality assurance process for third-party verification of the design and installation.  The commissioning phase confirms that the quality and technical requirements of the contract are met prior to handover to the owner, and the commissioning team plays an important role in the project quality processes.

However, the QA/QC process during construction is distinctly separate from the commissioning process.  The two quality processes need to remain separate and be managed by different groups.  This is important in order that a separate group is verifying the design and installation.  It is not appropriate to have the design group manage commissioning or the construction group manage commissioning, since this would mean that these groups are overseeing the quality and technical compliance of their own work.  This presents a conflict of interest and must be avoided by having a separate commissioning management process.  This ensures that the owner receives a contract-compliant system.

Construction quality is a key factor determining the success of commissioning.  A weak Quality Management System (QMS) during construction pushes all the installation issues to later in the project during the commissioning phase.  Commissioning instead becomes the quality control process that did not take place earlier as it should have during construction activities.  Instead of testing the systems to catch minor issues and placing the systems in-service, commissioning becomes the quality process to identify construction defects, causing many starts and stops to commissioning and delaying the project ISD.

A strong QMS needs to be implemented during the construction phase.  This includes in-field verification of installed equipment as well as verification of quality paperwork documenting the construction quality process.  In-field inspections and paperwork review are both required.  Paperwork verification does not substitute for in-field inspections and vice versa – both need to be part of a strong QMS.  Without a best-in-industry QMS implemented by the construction team, all the installation issues that should have been identified during construction inspections are instead deferred to later in the project and discovered during critical path on-site commissioning activities.  Float that exists within the construction schedule can be used to address installation deficiencies as they are discovered, rather than leaving installation issues to be discovered during commissioning.

Without a strong QMS implemented by the construction team, all the risk due to incorrectly installed equipment is deferred to the commissioning phase.  When issues are identified, each will take time to address, causing delays to the project ISD.

Resource Management

In advance of the commissioning phase, the Commissioning Manager determines the staffing requirements in order to execute each phase of commissioning.  This is done early in the project so that staffing estimates can be included in the project budget.  It is important to note that there are specialized skill sets required to fill many of the roles on the commissioning team – these are not just warm bodies to show up and “figure it out” and they go.  Having the right skill sets on the commissioning team is equally important as having the right number of people.  Having said this, hands-on commissioning experience is an excellent learning opportunity.  Senior commissioning team members are always happy to help and guide more junior members to get the valuable experience to eventually allow them to become the experienced senior members of the commissioning team.

As indicated earlier, labour costs for commissioning are not a significant portion of the overall project budget.  Costs do need to be allocated within the project budget to ensure that funds are available for staffing later in the project.  These funds must be protected in order that groups that precede commissioning do not re-allocate these funds.  You wouldn’t think that the project controls group would allow this to happen, but stranger things have happened on projects when cost overruns are occurring.

As well, prior to commissioning, specialized test equipment or any other material needs to be planned for and procured.  Some specialized test equipment can have a large cost and long lead-time, and these procurements need to be planned for in advance.

Some test equipment may be required for the ongoing operation of the plant.  It is beneficial to coordinate with the operation’s requirements for test equipment, since it may be in everyone’s best interest to advance procurement of operational equipment to be used during commissioning rather than purchase the same test equipment twice.

Procurement Management

Procurement of test equipment that is needed during commissioning is fairly straightforward.  Test equipment that is needed is identified in advance and purchased with enough lead time to ensure it arrives at the site when needed.

Procurement of the major plant equipment is more critical, and the commissioning team can help with this.

During the procurement phase of the project, factory test requirements need to be defined within each procurement contract.  Procurement contracts define the technical requirements for each piece of equipment as well as define the testing to be completed in the factory prior to the equipment being shipped to site.  For complex equipment such as automation cubicles, IFAT requirements can be quite involved, and the detailed requirements for this testing needs to be defined in advance of awarding contracts to vendors.  That way the equipment manufacturer knows the level of testing that is required and can allocate time within their delivery schedule to properly test the equipment.  Based on this information, you can then ensure that realistic procurement timelines (including IFAT) are included within the project schedule.

Unfortunately, IFAT is often skipped and only the hardware is verified in the factory, leaving the software to be verified at a later time.  The delivery of equipment becomes delayed for whatever reason and the project team feels it is more important to get the cubicles shipped to site for installation.  This is a short-sighted goal, as all the design and installation issues related to the integration of the software and hardware are deferred to site.  Any issues that would have been identified during IFAT now must be discovered during critical path on-site commissioning activities.  Despite the pressure to ship the equipment to site, a proper IFAT must be conducted.  Any schedule savings that may be perceived to exist by shipping the cubicles earlier are always lost with even more delays incurred while troubleshooting the equipment on-site.  The project ends up being delayed even further, with the poor commissioning team trying to address all the issues that were not caught during IFAT.

Integration Management

Integration management is an important aspect of a project, especially as it relates to commissioning.  But the project management literature does not cover this topic properly.

Integration management is explained as setting up the project including project charters, project plan, project schedule, etc.  These are important aspects of the project, but what about the practical integration management to ensure all aspects of the project are available when needed to support the project commissioning schedule?  Because only the front-end activities of integration management are covered, this is likely why commissioning is often overlooked and not given the focused attention it requires to make this important phase of the project successful.  The approach seems to be that if there is a charter, plan, and schedule prepared at the beginning of the project, everything will go per plan.  And we know this is never the case – things change, new information is discovered, issues are encountered, and equipment failures happen.  How do we flip the discussion so that integration management as it relates to commissioning is equally as important?

A strong project manager will know that the project initiation process to establish scope, schedule, and budget are only the first steps – equally as important is the execution of the plan to keep the project within the scope, schedule, and budget constraints.  It is the project managers role to ensure that design managers, construction managers, and project controls managers are keeping all aspects of the project in line with the plan to ensure the commissioning team has all the parts of the project when needed to fully integrate the project.  If this is not the case and parts of the project scope or schedule become misaligned, the commissioning team will not be able to integrate the project successfully.  For example, the electrical distribution system is required prior to testing the HVAC systems, since power is required to test the air handling units and HVAC controls.  The commissioning sequence will define when the power distribution system is required in relation to when the HVAC system is required.  All project participants must be working to the same project sequence.  However, if the power distribution system design package is late, causing the electrical installation to be late, there is no way for the commissioning team to proceed with testing the HVAC system while still waiting for the electrical distribution system.  The integration of the project must be managed right from the start to align with the project commissioning sequence to meet the ISD.

This is too often overlooked.  The project is too siloed, where the electrical team installing the power system is working independently from the mechanical team installing the HVAC system.  The project manager must ensure that all disciplines are aligned in order for the project to be integrated successfully by the commissioning team in the end.  And the commissioning manager can help the project manager and project team understand the sequence and requirements needed to successfully integrate the project. The earlier in the project this is completed, the better informed and better prepared the project team will be to meet the required deadlines and quality requirements.

Unfortunately, established project literature does not cover the integration management and commissioning process sufficiently.  Your project may seem to be progressing satisfactorily – designs are progressing, and equipment is being installed – until it comes to the commissioning phase and nothing works.  If your project has not been managed with an integrated approach, all the commissioning team can do at the end of the project is point out issues and incur schedule delays.  I’m not sure why commissioning is not given the focus that it needs in project literature to make projects successful.  I can only guess that is it because:

• The commissioning process is not well understood
• At the beginning of the project, the commissioning process is not perceived to provide value and is therefore not included in the project plan
• Projects over the last few decades have not been as complex, and commissioning was more likely to be completed much easier
• Project literature is more focused on less complex projects such as building commissioning or simple standalone projects

Some projects need to learn the value of commissioning the hard way, by approaching commissioning as an after-thought, and only realizing during or after commissioning that additional work earlier in the project was required to execute commissioning more efficiently and generate a more cost-effective end to the project.

Today’s projects are far too complex to leave commissioning as an afterthought.  Where past projects had more standalone systems and less automated controls, today’s projects are far more integrated and require detailed planning and execution in order to function correctly in the end.  The Integrated Commissioning Method ensures that the commissioning process is part of all stages of the project and ensures that complex systems can be successfully integrated as one plant process at the end of the project.

Conclusion

Commissioning is more than just performing tests on the equipment at the end of the project.  For the commissioning phase of your project to be successful, you need to have a project management approach to commissioning, addressing each of the project management topics discussed in this article.  Only with proper project management planning and an approach to mitigate risk early in the project can you successfully complete your commissioning on-time and on-budget.  Don’t leave commissioning to the end of the project – ensure that you have an integrated approach to commissioning throughout all phases of your project.