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Since the introduction of the Distributed Control System (DCS), process plant alarms have become essentially free, resulting in a tendency for the process engineer to implement more and more process alarms. The problem with over alarming a chemical process is that the operators, whose main responsibility is the safe operation of the process, will have to sift through the alarms to distinguish which are more important and require immediate action. This alarming problem has been identified as a contributing factor in numerous chemical process incidents, such as the Texaco Pembroke Refinery in the UK and others on the Gulf Coast. Alarm issues are caused when newly minted chemical engineering graduates become process engineers and are asked to suggest alarm settings for their projects without having an understanding of alarm management principles. Therefore we have developed this Alarm Documentation and Rationalization (D&R) Module to introduce alarm management concepts to undergraduate students. In this paper we describe our experience exposing undergraduate students to this D&R module and allowing them to implement and test their alarm settings on an actual DCS. Groups of four to five students were assigned to perform a D&R study on the process alarms for a reformate stabilizer column simulated in HYSYS and similar to such columns at many refineries. Students were asked to perform one of the following roles: process engineer, process control engineer, superintendent, or operator. Then, aided with D&R instructional material, including sample alarm configurations provided by local industry, they were tasked with rationalizing the alarms for this system. The module concluded by allowing the students to implement the alarms and test their operation on an actual DCS system.

An Alarming Experience: Results Of An Undergraduate Chemical Process Alarm Lab Module