Edif Plant Inspector Career and Training Guide

8/18/2019 Edif Plant Inspector Career and Training Guide

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The plant inspection and

integrity industryCareer and training guide 2015/16 edition


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Plant inspection and integrity industry career and training guide

Edif ERA, a global engineering, consultancy and training

company and part of the Edif Group (www.edifgroup.com),

has acquired Matthews Engineering Training Ltd., a market

leading provider of ASME and API certied inspector courses.

The courses are aimed at individuals and smaller contractors,

and can easily be tailored to meet the needs of blue chip and

corporate clients for in-house courses.

Prologue

www.edifgroup.com 1

Contents

Section Page

1. The inspection and integrity business 2

2. Inspection markets: worldwide 4

3. Inspection industry structure 7

4. Career groups and progression 10

5. Inspector terms and conditions – the facts 16

6. Works-vs-in-service inspection 22

7. Oce-vs-site inspection roles 25

8. Skills and qualications 28

9. Inspection skills self-assessment 32

10. Your training options 40

11. Engineering inspection careers: some advice

for new entrants 54


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The inspection and integrity business

www.edifgroup.com 3

1. The inspection and

integrity business


2

Plant inspection involves the basic activities of:

• Inspecting plant (mainly pressure equipment) for mechanical condition

• Checking equipment for compliance with statutory regulations (such as the UK

Pressure Systems Safety Regulations (PSSRs) in the UK or ASME/API codes incountries that have adopted these)

• Checking against technical standards, specications and published documents

• Inspecting for corrosion, defect and damage, and providing written reports on

the results

While plant inspection often involves the inspection of welds and Non-Destructive

Testing (NDT), it is a very dierent, more complex discipline than NDT. It has dierent

skill requirements, higher level technical content and a fundamentally dierent

structure of qualications.

Integrity engineering incorporates plant inspection but extends the role to include:

• A deeper understanding of equipment damage (corrosion) mechanisms and failure

modes covered in documents such as API 571

• Specifying suitable Non-Destructive Examination (NDE) methods and scopes to

ensure expected damage mechanisms are found

• Using inspection results to decide Fitness-For-Purpose (FFP) using more complex

methodologies and documents such as API 579, ASME B31G and DNV RP-101

The inspection and integrity business is made necessary by the combined

requirements of plant owners/users, purchasers and statutory authorities who share

the common aim that plant is constructed, operated and managed in a safe manner.

Fig.1 shows the traditional progression for people involved in this industry.

Fig.1 The plant inspection and integrity business

NDT Technician

/Weld Inspector

Plant Inspector

3 An appreciation of risk

3 Knowledge of damage mechanisms and severity

3 Fitness-for-purpose assessment of corroded items

3 Advisory reports to owners/users or H&S authorities

3 Inspecting plant for mechanical condition

(not just welds)

3 Basic code calculations

3 Knowledge of codes and standards

3 Accurate and decisive reporting

Integrity Engineer

Careerprogression


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4 www.edifgroup.com 5

2. Inspection markets: worldwide

Inspection markets: worldwide

The in-service inspection market divides fairly neatly into worldwide blocks,

characterised mainly by the maturity of the upstream Oil & Gas (O&G) business and

its downstream rening and product processing activities. Mature areas have evolved

well-established requirements for in-service inspectors and, some integrity and

corrosion engineers’ roles have become specialised and have developed some roles

into more specialised ones for integrity engineers and corrosion engineers.

Newer, developing country markets have a quickly developing, enthusiastic

requirement for basic inspection skills. Owing to their rate of growth, these markets

often lack experience and, therefore, they place reliance in acquiring inspectors with

existing recognised qualications.

Worldwide, the main breakdown is broadly as follows:

Europe

The oshore upstream market is led by the requirement for oshore inspectors in

the UK/Norway North Sea. Inspection roles and numbers are well established but this

market has an ageing inspector workforce. Tight legislative requirements support the

need for regular plant inspections. The onshore downstream renery market is very

mature with few, if any, reneries less than 30 years old. Inspector manning is muchlower than oshore, more specialised and segmented, and harder to get into without

higher academic qualications.

Norway and Holland have their own national inspector certication schemes.

USA and Canada

North America is a steady, mature market for mainly API-qualied inspectors rather

than those with higher level academic qualications.

Inspector salaries in the Texan Gulf region are well established and less volatile than

those in Canada, Alaska and many other countries in the world.

South America

Upstream and downstream O&G industry is developing with inspection practices

following mainly the USA model.

Central Asia and Russia

Ex-Russian republics’ O&G business is developing steadily with onshore and oshore

facilities. Overseas contractors have a large presence in the supply of inspectors

working on rotation contracts. Statutory requirements and inspection technical

practices are highly variable between countries and contracts.

North Africa

This region has developing gas markets with heavy involvement by contracting

companies operating as oshoots from UK/Europe gas utility companies. Emphasis

is on integrity engineer specialisms rather than volume supply of plant inspectors.

Inspection practices follow a combination of European and US ASME/API codes.

Central Africa

The central African oil industry is mainly served by US petrochemical operators’

inspectors on rotation contracts. Countries vary a lot and situations can change

quickly. Inspection practices follow mainly the USA model using ASME/API codes.

Middle East

Saudi Arabia and UAE have a mature market for inspectors. Inspector contracts

are mainly long-term residential positions rather than rotation contracts. Overall,

expatriate inspector numbers are steadily declining. Academically qualied engineers

are not in short supply.


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6

3. Inspection industry structure

Inspection industry structure

Structure of the business

Fig.2 shows the basic structure of the plant inspection business. The breakdown

is based almost entirely on the technical complexity of the inspection tasks and is

tracked fairly accurately by the technical ability, experience, and pay and conditions ofthe people working within it.

‘Insurance company’ inspections

These involve the periodic inspections of onshore pressure systems carried out by

the 1000 or so inspectors (sometimes called ‘surveyors’) who work for the so-called

‘insurance’ inspection companies. Most are simple visual inspections for minimum

compliance with the UK Pressure Systems Safety Regulations (PSSRs). In most cases,

the inspections themselves have precisely nothing to do with insurance although a lot

of people still think that they do.

Surveyors generally do multiple inspections per day; spend a lot of time driving

between sites and produce minimalist ‘generic’ inspection reports to a predetermined

pro-forma style. Some are sta employees, some are self-employed, and most are

over 40, having gained their main engineering experience working somewhere else.

Petroleum/petrochemical industry inspections

These divide fairly neatly into onshore – and oshore – based inspectors. The two

areas have slightly dierent proles.

Far East

A steadily developing area with young and academically qualied workforce in

both inspector and integrity/corrosion engineering roles. There are a few roles for

experienced expatriates in higher positions.

Australia/NZ

This is rapidly becoming a growth area in LNG (Liqueed Natural Gas) and general

oshore industry. There is a shortage of qualied/experienced inspectors, producing

active recruitment from the UK and other EU countries. Australia has its own

inspector certication scheme (AICIP) which is not extensively recognised in other

countries, so the situation is developing quickly.

New Zealand has a similar national scheme but there is also an increasing recognition

of ASME and API certicates and practices in the O&G industry.


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Inspection industry structure

Oshore inspection engineers are based oshore on either a 2–3 week rota (North

Sea) or a longer, perhaps 4–8 week rota in Africa, Asia, Russia, etc. Work involves

inspection of fairly complex systems of pipework, vessels and valves. Reports may be

quite detailed, involving corrosion and tness-for-purpose issues or may be of a more

simplied ‘pro-forma’ type, depending on the company.

Onshore inspection engineers work in reneries, petrochemical plants and other

parts of the downstream oil/gas chain. Broadly speaking, they have a higher level of

academic training than their oshore equivalents and their inspection work tends

to be more heavily concentrated into shutdown or ‘turnaround’ inspections. Self-

employed or agency inspectors are often employed during these shutdowns to make

up the numbers.

‘Agency’ inspectors

Agency inspectors work for inspection agencies under either self-employed or sta

(pay as you earn (PAYE)) status doing any of the above jobs. The only dierence is

their employer, the agency, hires them out to plant owners on temporary or semi-

permanent contracts where they do more or less the same job as the plant owner’s

sta inspectors.

Onshore inspection engineers work in reneries, petrochemical plants, and other

parts of the downstream oil/gas chain. Broadly speaking, they have a higher level of

academic training than their oshore equivalents and their inspection work tends

to be more heavily concentrated into shutdown or ‘turnaround’ inspections. Self-

employed or agency inspectors are often employed during these shutdowns to make

up the numbers.

Fig.2

Pressure equipment

Rotating equipment

Offshore/Marine equipment

Storage tanks

Lifting equipment

Boiler plant

Insurance surveyors

The inspection industrystructure


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10

Career groups and progression

4. Career groups and progression

Historically, almost no-one starts their engineering career in plant inspection. Of the

few that do, perhaps with high hopes that their rst degree or MSc will give them a

stepping stone to greatness, most leave within a year or two to pursue some other

career path – typically project engineering, corrosion engineering or the more loosely

dened ‘integrity engineering’. Notwithstanding this, there are four main career entry

routes (see Fig.3).

The NDT technician route

A lot of inspectors move into inspection from an NDT technician’s background. They

have formal NDT qualications (CSWIP, PCN, ASNT, etc.) and have gained practical

experience by involvement with rope access activities, welding, fabricated structures

and pressure equipment. NDT technicians also benet from the experience of dealing

with plant manufacturers, contractors and operators, and they have an appreciation

of the ways that they all interact with each other. Areas of weakness may include:

• Lack of experience of the operational aspects of engineering plant

• Uncertainty of technical knowledge in some areas of plant design, degradation/

failure mechanisms, and academic topics such as tness-for-purpose assessment

• Adapting from the world of NDT; this is based around ‘hard-edged’ and well-denedtechniques, procedures and defect acceptance criteria, compared with the ‘multiple

shades of grey’ world of in-service inspection which makes more use of judgement.

Fig.3 The main career routes into inspection

Specialist InspectorIntegrity Engineer

In-serviceplant inspection

NDTTechnician

PlantOperator

Graduate/Project

Engineer

NewConstruction

Inspection/QA


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The plant operator route

Traditionally, many plant inspectors started their careers in plant operations in power,

process or marine engineering. The solid levels of plant experience and academic

achievement required form a sound technical background for an eventual move

into plant inspection. Although it has not disappeared completely, this route has

depleted steadily over the past 20 years. Weaknesses in inspectors coming from this

route include:

• Poor knowledge of important design codes, regulations and statutory aspects

• Limited experience of industry-specic technical issues (materials, designs, etc.)

They are often generalists with a wide, but shallow, knowledge base.

In recent years, career benets (mainly salaries) for competent operations technicians

and engineers in onshore power/process/petrochemical industries have become

quite attractive, thereby, discouraging salary-related career moves into onshore

plant inspection.

The graduate/project engineer route

This is the most modern career route into plant inspection. It will probably grow and,

perhaps, become the dominant route in the future. It has its root in the graduate

engineer, employed by construction, contracting or process/petrochemical utility

organisations. Graduates will typically start their engineering career in a specic

project engineering roles or as part of an in-company graduate training scheme

involving experience of several dierent jobs over a period of a few years. At some

point, they take on the role of project engineer for a specic project, involving theconstruction, refurbishment or operational aspects of plant.

It is the wide responsibilities of the project engineer that often kick-start a graduate

engineer’s interest in plant inspection. Inspection plays a part in most plant projects

and the technical complexity (and diculties) of the role soon become apparent.

In common with the other inspection career routes, the graduate entry route has

weaknesses. Typically, these are:

• Lack of hands-on engineering experience

• Poor initial appreciation of the ways that technical and management disciplines

interleave together rather than act alone

In practice, these weaknesses have a short timescale. Graduates that have survived

the selection procedures of major companies have the cognitive ability to absorb

large amounts of technical information and so learn very quickly. They also have the

advantage that they are not encumbered by the restricted mindset of having worked

in a single role. These clear advantages have to be taken in context. In most cases, the

latent technical power of graduates is never fully received into the world of in-service

inspection; instead, it is used as a technical stepping-stone towards progression in

other disciplines that have a higher management prole.

Crossover from other specialisms

Inspectors involved in the pre-purchase ‘shop’ inspection of new equipment may want

to cross into in-service inspection, chasing its higher salaries and better prospects.

This can be dicult: shop inspection is more about the niceties of documentation and

procedures than corroded metal and damaged vessels, and such inspectors may nd

a step change in their knowledge base is required to make a successful transition.

Specialists in predominantly non-technical subjects (such as Quality Assurance (QA),

contract management and procurement) are also found in inspection. Although it

is not uncommon to nd in-service inspectors with this type of background, they

frequently struggle to meet the level of technical appreciation necessary to deal

with inspection issues that arise in complex plant, and they nd the job dicult

and stressful.

Taken together, these four routes make up the majority of paths taken by technicians

and engineers who become inspectors. Although the routes themselves have

dierent backgrounds and involve dierent types of people, the technical skills that

have to be acquired to do the job of inspection do not vary that much.


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this and a number of dierent institutions accredited to award it. Once this is out

of the way, your climb up the inspection career ladder will be most inuenced by

the level of technical knowledge that you can acquire via a combination of training

and experience. To keep on climbing, you have to keep on learning, thereby, placing

yourself ahead of the majority who can’t be bothered.

Having a set of career targets and objectives is a good idea. Career trajectories do

vary, depending on your starting point, and it makes sense not to jump too far, too

fast. Steady progression is best, as it is more likely to be sustainable. Fig.4 shows

realistic career progression routes from ve dierent starting positions. This also

shows our recommendation for short- and medium-term career goals, and the best

training course with which to start.

Career progression in the inspection industry

Once you get a secure foothold on the in-service inspection ladder, you will nd

fewer barriers to progression than in many other parts of the industry. To climb to

the best positions in large oil companies, you will need higher technical qualications

because that is how they think. This in itself is no longer the barrier it once was.

Degree courses are plentiful, some much easier than others, and course length and

attendance required is variable. Overall, there is something to t all, for anyone who

has the determination to register for a course and put in the eort. See Section 11 of

this Guide for some advice at passing degree courses.

Excluding the oil majors, in many inspection companies, a degree qualication willnot give you any particularly special status. An institution membership grade such as

Incorporated Engineer (I Eng) will be just as good. There are several ways to achieve Fig.4 Routes for progressing up the inspection career ladder fromvarious starting points in the engineering industry

CURRENTPOSITION

CURRENT DUTIESCURRENT

QUALIFICATIONSPROGRESSION EMPHASIS

SHOULD BE ONREALISTIC 5 YEAR

OBJECTIVERECOMMENDED2–3 YEAR TARGET

RECOMMENDEDSTARTING POINT

KEY CHALLENGES

New construction‘shop’ inspector

Agency or independentwitnessing staged inspections

involving weld inspection,pressure tests and QA/documentation reviews

NDT/weld inspection/QA qualications. Some

manufacturing experience

Successfully transferringdisciplines from shop to

in-service inspections

Permanent/contractposition as an inspector

of major systems inheavy industrial/process

applications

A secure sta position in in-service inspectionbuilding up experience

ASME Level 1 PlantInspector qualifcation

Adapting to the dierentdiscipline and wider scope

of in-service inspection

‘insurance company’in-service inspector

Home-based. Multiple localdaily visits for lifting/minor

pressure equipment

Plant operation and generalengineering experience,possibly leading to I Eng

Expanding your technicalscope to access higher value

inspection work

Permanent/contractposition with plant owners/

user with increasingtechnical knowledge and

responsibility

Obtaining credibility as aninspector of major systems

in heavy industrial/process applications

ASME Level 1 PlantInspector qualifcation. Boiler Inspection and

PRV training

Adapting to dealingwith inspection situations

with highly informed owners/users who may dispute yourknowledge and conclusions

Inspection Engineerfor land based

‘owner-user’ operator

Renery or plant-based.Planning and performanceof inspections during

plant shutdowns

I Eng or equivalent level.

Possibly BSc/BEng level withgood technical knowledge

of plant operations andmaintenance

Building high level reportingand analysis skills to supplement

your technical knowledge

Technical seniormanagement position

Becoming familiarwith detailed FFP and

NII assessments

ASME Level 2 qualifcation. API 579 FFP training course. NIII (DNV-RP-G103)

training

Self-motivation to expand your technical skills indicult areas outside yourimmediate comfort zone

Ofshore NDE/ Inspection Technician

Oshore 3/2 rotation position. Rope access/NDEwork on structures, vessels

and pipework

Rope access, NDE/weldinspector qualications plus

oshore specic safetycourses etc

Acquiring technical knowledgein equipment and inspectioncodes outside the NDE feld.Obtaining qualifcations to

demonstrate additionalcapabilities

Capability of handlingoverseas rotation position

at upstream or downstreampetrochemicals industry

facility

Appointment in OshoreInspection Engineer

(OIE) position

ASME Level 1 PlantInspector qualifcation

Progressing from NDE tothe wider and complex

world of equipment damagemechanisms, design and

inspection codes and thoroughinspection reporting

Fully mobile‘ex-patriate’ inspector

Overseas 28/28 rotationat upstream or

downstream petrochemicalsindustry facility

Varied engineeringbackground plus possibly

job specic ASME L1 or API510/570/653 qualication

Increasing your knowledgeof new plant and equipment

types to increase your exibility between industries

A greater choice ofemployers/locations in which

you will be accepted ashaving desirable knowledge

and qualications

At least 2 API certied inspector certicates

supplemented by ASME Level 2 for its detailed reporting capabilities

ASME Level 1 PlantInspector qualifcation.

Additional API 510/570/653certifcates

Continuing to expand yourknowledge when it may notcurrently appear necessary

in your current position


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16

Inspector terms and conditions – the facts

5. Inspector terms and conditions

– the facts

Plant inspection, because of its wide variety, is characterised by a similarly wide

spread of salary terms and conditions. The relationship between them varies over

time and with industry activity but the underlying pattern is fairly well established so it

doesn’t vary that much.

One signicant feature is lack of dependence of inspector terms and conditions on

the economic cycle of growth or recession. Economic activity has some eect on

work available for new construction ‘shop’ inspectors as manufacturing activity goes

up or down but for in-service inspection it has less real eect. Plants still continue to

operate during recession and, therefore, require inspection.

On a global scale, the predominant driver of oil industry inspection budgets is the

wholesale price of crude oil. Bits of geopolitics and the odd conict here and there

cause local eects but problems in one country simply mean that industry focus

moves elsewhere until things calm down. High oil prices mean greater revenue for

both upstream and downstream sectors, so inspection budgets, which are a fairly

small percentage of the total cost base anyway, feel less pressure. When oil prices fall,

there is a delay in any corresponding reduction of operators’ budgets. Oil companies

are well used to operating in a cyclic market and their activities may not change at

all as they know the price will soon rise again. This dampens out any dramatic cyclic

swings in inspection budgets, enabling the industry to operate on a surprisinglyeven keel.

In this environment, inspector salary terms and conditions nd their own level based

on supply and demand. Individual conditions vary but the overall pattern shown in

Figs. 5, 6, and 7 emerges. This is based on conditions for inspectors working in and

from the UK but it is not that much dierent elsewhere.

Fig.5 Inspectors terms and conditions

Terms &conditions

Plant inspectionqualifications


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Fig.6

Home-based‘Competent Person’

Inspector

PlantInspector

Inspector roles –work, life and holidays

20,000 miles per year

Pressure/LiftingEquipment

40 hrs per week for48 weeks per year

2 week/2 week

offshore rotation

28 day/28 dayoverseas rotation

50-60 hrs per weekon site for 16 weeksper year

WORK

HOLIDAY

Fig.7

Inspector salaries

Home-based

new-construction‘shop’ inspector

Home-based‘insurance surveyor’inspector

Site-based in-serviceplant inspector

Site-based

‘integrity engineer’

Offshore-basedinspection engineer:UK or expatriate

Inspector role

% A

n n u a l a v e r a g e s a l a r

y *

*The average annual salary

in the UK for 2012 was

approximately £28,000

100%

200%

300%


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Home-based new construction ‘shop’ inspector’s salary levels are generally the

lowest, ranging from about 110% to 140% of the national average salary. Inspection

agencies and companies all tender against each other for contracts, competing

almost entirely on price, as they are all drawing from the same pool of inspectors.

This keeps salaries down. Shop inspection agency positions are not too dicult to

secure if you have decent engineering and QA experience. Working hours are routine,

and many jobs come with a company car because of the daily travelling required.

Home-based ‘insurance surveyor’ terms and conditions are much the same as those

for shop inspectors. In the larger companies, surveyors may work on an ‘inspection

points’ system, requiring them to complete a minimum number of inspections per

week. The work involves mainly visual inspections of minor pressure plant andlifting equipment items, and is regular, repetitive and fairly secure. About 100 small

independent companies and agencies compete for the smaller contracts that the few

larger ones don’t bother with.

Site-based ‘in-service’ plant inspector’s salary terms are generally higher than those

for home-based roles. Once a plant inspector has moved up out of the ‘NDT/weld

inspection only’ bracket then site work is available on either a permanent basis or for

periodic plant shutdowns or ‘turnarounds’. These can last anything from 3 weeks to

6 months, as multiple plant assets are shut down and inspected in sequence. Salary

equivalents are higher, depending on the role, ranging from about 125% to 170% of

the national average salary. Higher incomes are available where dicult locations,

working conditions or experience requirements are involved. You can expect working

hours to be long and hard and you won’t be going home at 5pm.

Site-based ‘integrity engineer’ roles are a progression for some plant inspectors.

These have higher technical qualication requirements and you need a wide and

proven technical knowledge base. If you don’t have this you will be found out fairly

quickly. The rewards are much higher; 180–220% of the average national salary is a

reasonable expectation with some of the larger companies. Reneries generally oer

the highest salaries but have the most stringent requirements. In return, the hours

are again long and inconvenient and you will be expected to show a high commitment

to the role rather than just using it as a stepping stone to elsewhere.

Oshore-based inspection engineer roles oer a unique balance of technical

capability versus reward. Salaries can be as high as 200–300% of the national average

salary and the working schedule is attractive, varying from 2 weeks on, 2 weeks o

to 2 weeks on, 3 weeks o, depending on the operator. Employment status can be

either self-employed/agency or full-time sta.

In overseas developing countries (either onshore or oshore), salaries are

comparable to the above but leave rotation will be dierent. A 28-day on/o rotation

is common. Traditional annual expatriate positions are still available overseas but for

the best salaries you will need to work in the newer oil producing countries rather

than the traditional Middle East destinations.

Onshore-based inspection engineer roles exist to service the oshore inspection

industry. These include the less technical QA/planning-type roles to corrosion

engineer and ‘inspection technical authority’ positions that most oshore inspection

companies have. Salaries are again high but heavily inuenced by supply and demand

for the people with the correct skills who will accept an oce-based role without the

holidays available on an oshore schedule. To progress to the highest onshore salary

levels, you will need to move into a management position, dealing with people as well

as related technical issues. Some enjoy this and some don’t.


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22

Works-vs-in-service inspection

6. Works-vs-in-service

inspection

There is a clear boundary between the activities of in-service inspection and those

of new construction inspection. Construction inspection is the inspection of new

equipment during manufacture and its pre-use commissioning on site. Similar to

in-service inspection, construction inspection is inuenced by technical codes and

standards (and for some equipment, statutory requirements) but the main drivers are

the commercial requirements and preferences of the purchaser.

From a technical viewpoint, the scope of construction inspection is actually wider than

that of in-service inspection. This is because most items of engineering plant are not

covered by in-service legislative requirements. Items such as pressure equipment,

lifting equipment, some structural items, vehicles, etc. are subject to in-service

inspection legislation in most developed countries but vast amounts of other types of

engineering items are not. In-service inspection of these excluded items is, therefore,

an option rather than being mandatory and is left to the owners or users to either do

it or not, as they think t.

Fig.8 shows the dierences between the two inspection roles.

Technically, the knowledge requirements for in-service inspection are wider than

those of construction inspection. Once a piece of equipment has been put into

use, it is subject to various degradation mechanisms – corrosion, fatigue, creep and

straightforward wear and tear – that are not an issue with new equipment.

With most equipment, the issues of integrity and FFP are made more complex by

the eects of these degradation mechanisms. As a rule, the more complex the

design and construction of a piece of equipment, the greater is the complexity of the

eects of its degradation in use. This means that, for complex equipment such as

turbine pumps, pressure systems, etc., the assessment of FFP and integrity becomes

progressively more dicult as time progresses. Worse still, the eects of most

degradation mechanisms are not linear and so general levels of uncertainty and risk

increase unpredictably during a piece of equipment’s operational life.

What inspectors do

Fig.8

N e w c

o n s t r u c t i o n

‘ s h o p i n s p e c t o r s ’

Witness routine material tests

Review material certificates

Review welder qualifications

Check welding and NDT results

Witness pressure tests

Check compliance with specified manufacturing code

Sign off documentation packages

I n - s e

r v i c e

‘ p l a n t i n s p e c t o r s ’

Understand how plants work

Assess corrosion mechanisms

Evaluate inspection frequencies

Use initiative to recommend repairs

Detailed technical reports

FFP calculations and assessments

VESSEL GOES INTO SERVICE

In-service inspection is more varied.

The technical scope is wider, with morefreedom of opinion and interpretation.


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24

7. Office-vs-site inspection roles

Office-vs-site inspection roles

In-service inspection rarely has the degree of predictability that can (sometimes)

exist in new construction inspection. For this reason, in-service inspection rarely

involves quantitative aspects alone; qualitative techniques such as risk-based analysis

have to be used in order to handle the uncertainty. This is what makes in-service

inspection interesting.

Plant inspection careers can involve either oce-based or site roles (see Fig.9).

Surprisingly, there is less t ime-based ‘promotion’ progression from site inspector

to oce-based ‘Integrity Engineer’ or ‘Technical Authority’ work than in many other

engineering roles. Many oce-based inspection engineers have very little practical

inspection experience and they prefer to concentrate on computer-based RBI

analysis, preparation of inspection plans and the reviewing of reports rather than

crawling around inside vessels.

Most oce-based inspection roles involve some visits to plants but this is very

dierent to a job which involves day-to-day hands-on inspection. Hands-on inspectors

invariably have the best experience in nding corrosion mechanisms in real vessels

and pipework, but they may take the easy option in handing over their ndings to

others for diagnosis of FFP conclusions.

This split of responsibilities is most prevalent in the oshore industry where

owner/operator clients are often the driving force in supporting their contractors

to employ a large number of oce-based ‘integrity/corrosion engineer’ support

sta. In European companies, these roles generally require an engineering

degree. Educational requirements for oshore plant inspectors are lower and

NDT qualications, supplemented by plant inspector certicates, take priority over

academic excellence. This has a lot in common with the US model where API CertiedInspector certicates take priority.

Onshore downstream facilities have a dierent bias. Overall, their plant inspectors

have a higher academic level so the split between plant inspector and integrity

engineer is more blurred, and the role of the plant inspector wider and more

technically challenging. Reneries, in particular, frequently employ inspectors with the

best and most usable mixture of hard, practical engineering knowledge and technical

analysis skills. In European companies, these roles are dicult to get into without an

engineering degree or similar higher qualication as well as more practically-based

plant inspector certicates.


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Office-vs-site inspection roles

Job titles vary between company and country, but some typical titles that may be used

for inspection roles are:

Predominantly office-based

• Integrity Engineer

• Technical Authority

• Corrosion Engineer

• Risk-based Inspection (RBI) Engineer

• Pipework Engineer

• Vessel Engineer

• Storage Tank Engineer

• Inspection Support Engineer

• Inspection Co-ordinator

• ‘Work-pack’ Engineer

Site-based (onshore/offshore operating plant)

• Plant Inspector

• Oshore Inspection Engineer

• API-certied Inspector (API 510/570/653)

• Inspection Technician

• Engineer ‘Surveyor’ (normally used by insurance companies who also do low-levelinspection of pressure and lifting equipment)

Fig.9

Office-vs-site roles

Offshore (upstream) roles

Offshore

Inspectors rarelyvisit the office

Office

Planning andspreadsheets

Lots ofmeetings

Onshore

(downstream) roles

Refineries andpetrochemical facilities

Inspection and asset managementroles are more combined


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28

Skills and qualifications

8. Skills and qualifications

Why is inspector competence an awkward issue?

There are two main reasons. First, the technical scope of the subject is so wide – an

inspector may be required to inspect anything from a simple low-pressure garage air

receiver to a highly dangerous process reactor operating under corrosive conditionsat high pressures. Second, most of the statutory legislation that governs in-service

inspection relies on the inspection industry practising a high degree of self-regulation,

it is charged with deciding the competence of its inspectors itself rather than

requirements being externally imposed. The resulting freedom means that each

inspection organisation takes a dierent view of what qualications and experience its

inspectors require, and how their competence will be assessed.

European qualications for plant inspectors are a fairly recent innovation. Whereas

the USA has a long-established system of inspector qualication (The American

Petroleum Institute (API) certicate programme), the EU has no such uniform legal

requirement. In recent years, however, pressure from enforcement authorities,

accreditation bodies and plant owner/user clients themselves has brought the

technical competence of plant inspectors into focus. Existing certication schemes

limited to weld inspection and NDT disciplines do not t well with the much wider

discipline of pressure systems inspection. Why should they? It’s a dierent subject.

Which inspector certification schemes are around?

The situation is less extensive for in-service inspection than for pressure equipment

new construction inspection. Most of the 196 or so countries in the world have no

legally-binding requirements at all for certication of in-service plant inspectors. Plant

operating companies either decide their own requirements for their inspectors or do

whatever they need to do in order to satisfy whichever government department or

ministry is in charge of plant and personnel safety.

A few individual countries have developed their own programmes and preferences

for inspector certication. Some are legal, some quasi-legal, and for others their

status is dicult to determine from outside. There may also be some crossover with

new construction inspection or the nuclear and/or oshore industries, and the extent

of the requirements vary from individual inspector certication to a more general

system of audit or registration. The main ones are:

• The Netherlands

• Norway

• Malaysia

• Singapore• Australia

• New Zealand

• Germany

• China

• The USA and Canada

Fig.10 shows a summary.

The USA and Canada

Most areas of North America have legal requirements for inspectors to be individually

certied. The main players are the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME),

the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the National Board of Boiler and Pressure

Vessel Inspectors (NBBPVI), presided over by the legal ‘jurisdiction’ of each individual

state. Supplementary legal requirements are set or policed by the Occupational

Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) and investigated by the Chemical Safety

Board (CSB) after accidents occur.

The main inspector Individual Certication Programme (ICP) for the petroleum

industry in the USA and Canada is the API ICP, covering API 510, 570 and 653. In

many states, this is a legal requirement. ASME and NBBPVI certication and certicate

programmes have comparable legal status, with preferences varying between states.


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Skills and qualifications

ASME and API certification programmes outside North America

In countries outside North America these programmes have little, if any, legal

signicance. They do, however, have increasing recognition because:

• They are seen as useful as a ‘benchmark qualication’ when there are no

others available

• Like it or not, the oil industry worldwide is dominated by ASME and API

construction codes

• US-based oil companies operating in other countries are more familiar with them

than with other national certication programmes

In Europe, the acceptance of these ASME- and API-based certication (and certicate)

programmes is increasing. Some countries are more enthusiastic about adopting

them than others who prefer their European harmonised codes and standards to

ASME and API documents. Similarly, some like the ASME and API approaches to

code-based, multiple-choice question examinations and competence testing, whereas

others prefer a more measured approach.

In developing countries, the achievement of overseas certicates is likely to carry

signicant weight in itself, with few questions asked about any level of competence

assessment lying behind them.

To conclude, on a worldwide basis, the ASME and API certicate programmes are the

main players, with increasing recognition. National schemes will continue in the few

countries that have them; some of them are technically quite good but they struggle

to gain recognition outside their country of origin.

Inspector certificationprogrammes worldwide

Fig.10

Worldwide certification ASME L1/L2/L3 (outside of North America)API 510/570/653 (including North America)

National certification Holland/Norway/Australia/New Zealand/Malaysia


18/38


19/38



Inspection skills self-assessment

Secure inside your comfort zone

You like the warm feeling of working well within your own technical comfort

zone, however narrow this may be. Importantly, your comfort zone is

two-dimensional covering:

• The technical subjects that you understand

• Your limitations in making decisions and defending them against the views of

people who disagree

When inspection issues or questions fall within this comfort zone, you feel quite

happy, perhaps even enthusiastic, in giving answers to questions. Once an issuemoves outside it, you get worried, fall strangely silent, and are relieved to refer the

situation to someone else. Much of your experience has taken place within the

envelope of this comfort zone, and you have never thought of expanding it to several

times its current size. You prefer to tinker round the edges where the risks are lower.

Happy with limited decision-making

A fair percentage of technicians or engineers venture into inspection because of the

opportunities it oers to stray (cautiously, perhaps) outside their technical comfort

zone. This is normally coupled with a widening of their technical scope and a vision of

the resulting career progression. Hidden behind this vision, the requirement to make

technical decisions in your newly-acquired areas of expertise soon appears. Perhaps

50–60% of new inspector entrants will react positively to this challenge and become

adept at making these decisions, cautiously at rst, as they learn to adapt to their

new technical environment. The rest will never feel comfortable, spend a short time

avoiding the whole subject of technical decision-making, followed by a return to the

NDE, plant operations or oce-based role from which they came.

Active decision-searcher

If you are one of these, you thrive on making decisions. Once one decision made, it is

mentally archived and an active search resumed for another one to solve. Given that

true decision-makers are born rather than made, they divide about 30:70 into those

who realise that active decision-making (particularly getting it wrong) is one of the

world’s best and most ecient learning mechanism and those who simply enjoy being

at the centre of things rather than sitting passively on the sidelines while others take

centre stage (these, of course, are the ones who mention it on their CV).

Inspection provides the ideal vehicle for decision-searchers. The technical scope is

so wide that learning can be continuous and never-ending, with the comfort zone

remaining rmly on the horizon, never to be reached. That is what these people like.

Do not underestimate the importance of this assessment of your approach to the

technical comfort zone. It is as important as all your technical qualications and

analytical abilities put together, and so if you nd the subject awkward and prefer

not to think about it, you will almost certainly experience diculties tting into a

long-term inspection role.

Personal attributes of the inspector

It is fair to say that most people in the engineering industry would not t easily into a

high-prole role in technical inspection. Recruited into large organisations to ll some

traditional (perhaps articially) dened technical roles, schooled in team-working

and the search for consensus however meaningless, they nd the cold world of an

inspection role just that bit too awkward. Technical argument and conict, it seems, lie

just round every corner, with metallurgists, corrosion engineers and self-proclaimed

experts in this and that waiting to pounce at the rst sign that their territory feels

under threat. If, however, you can accept this as the central territory of the inspector,

then it is useful to look at what are the main attributes that an inspector needs to

succeed in this awkward little role. Fig.11 shows the breakdown.


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Fig.11

Integrity

Analyticalability

Perception Listening

Basic numeracy Independence

What you need tobe an inspector

A broadengineeringawareness

Focus

A methodicalapproach

Integrity

This means many things but in inspection it means being able to stand rmly behind

your technical decisions in the face of outside inuences. These inuences can be

informed or misinformed, persuasive or aggressive, considered or intemperate,

well-meaning and honest or not. They are all imposters, there to be resisted in equal

measure, if you feel you are correct.

Resilience

Without this you can’t reach your integrity objectives because they go hand in hand.

The level of technical resilience you can achieve is directly proportional to the level oftechnical knowledge you can demonstrate during inspection discussions. Notice that

the issue is about knowledge you can demonstrate rather than that which you claim

lies behind your qualications or gold-embossed certicates you have collected.

Independence

In most plant inspection situations, you don’t have the luxury of an army of technical

advisers and experts that you can turn to for advice. Even if you belong to a company

with large technical resources, they will very often not be available to you to provide

the instant and authoritative technical response that you may need. Over time, most

inspectors nd that they have to make the most of the on-site technical decisions

themselves, using the best combination of specications, codes and standards,

reference documents and personal experience that they can assemble, often under

pressure, and always short of time. For this, you need to be able to act independently,

choosing the correct technical decision or solution from the possibilities that you

have found (yourself).

Keeping your focus

Inspection situations are full of opinions, diversions, topical or interesting side issues,

and tempting paths of circle and spiral that lead nowhere. It can be very easy to get

misled by all of this so inspection is about keeping your focus on the main issues. The

fact that the discussions are predominantly technical helps but it is still a key point.

This is one attribute that can improve quite quickly as an inspector builds up his/her


21/38




experience or, equally, drifts away at the expense of looking for some easy consensus

solution that will oend no-one, even if it does not achieve the real objective of the

inspection visit or discussion.

Listening

Inspectors do better if they spend more time listening than talking. Unless you

have innite time to absorb the content of hundreds of published documents

and standards, a lot of the relevant technical information that you need will come

from other people during inspection discussions. To make the best use of this, an

inspector needs the ability to listen and then pick out the relevant points from the

casual discussion, misguided opinion and technical noise.

Perception and analytical skills

This is a subset of listening. It involves picking out the technical truth from the

elements of technical persuasion that will inevitably come your way. Most technical

inspection situations are suciently complex to have several convincing-sounding

technical solutions, but some will have weaknesses or involve some hidden

compromise that you will only discover later. As with technical focus, this is an

attribute that gets easier with experience, assuming you have the necessary mental

processing power to hold it.

Using a methodical approach

For nding your way through an inspection situation to the correct decision, raw

intuition works ne but a methodical approach is better. The ability to work throughan issue, technical specication or inspection plan step by step, point by point, g ives

the best structure for covering all the issues, without anything going missing. Rather

than stiing intuition, this approach actually encourages it, providing a structure onto

which an inspector can hang his or her experience and use it to best advantage.

Most technicians and engineers have a head start on this attribute as it ts with

the engineering mindset that guided their choice of career in the rst place. For

the few who have lost it or turned in the other direction in pursuit of softer ‘people

management’ skills, they will nd their result in some wrong or missed decisions and

they will have a little more chaotic appearance to their inspection activities.

Basic numeracy

Basic maths nds its way into many in-service (and new construction)

inspections for uses such as:

• Minimum thickness calculations (all types of pressure equipment)

• Material properties (carbon equivalent, PREN number, etc.)

and more complex applications such as:

• Pump tests

• Rotating machinery performance tests

• Vibration and balancing

Inspectors who can’t (or won’t) do basic maths really are at a major career

disadvantage. Day by day you will nd yourself in situations where you are forced

either to rely on the calculations of others or remain suspiciously silent in the hope

that your inability will not be noticed. Over time, it is impossible to ignore calculations

completely and some inspection contracts contain lots of them, often related to

ASME/API code compliance checking or Fitness-For-Service (FFS) assessments. This

is a major area of self-improvement that inspectors can adopt to help their own

situation. The level of maths required for inspections can be learned, with the correct

instruction, by almost anyone with a mechanical or technical background as long as

they have the urge to try.

A broad engineering awareness

On balance, in-service plant inspection is more generalist than specialist. The scope

of equipment in any petroleum, petrochemical or process plant is wide; there arehundreds of equipment types, using thousands of engineering principles and a wide

range of materials, welding and design processes. The more of these an inspector

has an appreciation of, the easier and more eective the inspection job becomes.

As usual, it gets easier with experience as long as you understand the fundamental

dierence between 10 years of varied and knowledge-building experience and 6

months of blinkered experience merely repeated 20 times.


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40

Your training options

10. Your training options

Before you start

In the world of plant inspection, like anywhere else, no qualication alone will

guarantee you either an entry into your rst inspection job or provide a passport into

a better one. Plant inspectors who secure the most highly paid jobs are invariablythose who can combine the relevant qualications with hard-edged experience

and the personal attributes that make for a high-level technical awareness, focus,

and decision-making ability. Sections 7 and 8 of this Guide provide you with some

guidance as to what these are and some basic self-assessment routines that you can

use to rm up your thoughts about your own abilities.

Specialised plant inspection training is important, but , before you get too carried away

with training options (or waste your time and money), please consider these few basic

points of advice:

If you are a new engineering (rst or second degree) graduate with no practical

experience at all, it is highly unlikely that you will go straight into hands-on plant

inspection, become quickly established and respected, and rocket up the hierarchy,

however many inspection qualications you obtain. The short-cuts that you seek

are, unfortunately, just not there. You are not the only person to think of that

idea. In reality, you will most likely start in a desk-based ‘spreadsheet’ inspection

co-ordination role, nd diculty in getting real practical experience (as you are

so good at spreadsheets), and leave in a year or two to pursue some other non-

inspection discipline within which your inspection certicates will have little inherent

career value.

If, as a new graduate, you really do want to work in inspection, your best bet is to do a

couple of years of hands-on inspections, see if you like it, nd out if you are any good,

and then pursue inspection qualications. Without this previous hard engineering

and inspection experience, you will have a continuing credibility problem and your

technical decisions and inspection reports will be an attractive target for all to criticise

and overturn.

For more general advice on passing an engineering degree in the rst place, have a

look at Section 11 of this Guide .

If you are a hands-on plant operator, NDE technician or craftsman with no

high-level academic qualications (HND, degree, etc.), there is no need at all to be

apprehensive about moving into plant inspection. Most good plant inspectors have

more practical abilities than academic ones, and the level of mathematics analysis

skills you need can be learned. If you have a basic secondary school education and

have achieved RT/UT (radiographic testing/ultrasonic testing) certicates then you

almost certainly have the ability to do the basic maths if you are willing to put the

necessary eort in.

Once again, it is unwise to start with the hardest, most specialised courses. You

may fail and then, following several equally unsuccessful re-sits, start to question

the whole idea of your change of career. Also, in the small and closed world of

inspection employers, poor exam performances and reputations soon become

common knowledge and a hidden ceiling will slowly and quietly descend upon your

career prospects.

The best way to start is with a general ‘Level 1’ introduction to plant inspection

training course. Lasting 4–5 days, this will give you a good overall picture of the

statutory regulations, published codes and documents involved in the world of plant

inspection, so you can see if you like it.

If you are a new construction ‘shop inspector’ or ‘weld inspector’ with a certain

amount of engineering knowledge but no experience of working on operating plant

then, once again, it is not a good idea to take the most advanced or specialised

courses rst. They will not project you instantly to the top of the employment

prospects pile, because you will still lack experience and nd that the restricted

syllabus of the most specialised qualications still only covers a small part of the

technical knowledge that you need. Employers know this; it is the combination of

qualications and in-service inspection experience that they look for. Shop inspection

experience is not hugely valued among many in-service inspector employers.


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In this position, the best advice is, again, to start with a general ‘Level 1’ introduction

to in-service plant inspection training course. This will start you on the road of

conversion to the in-service inspection eld and open up your prospects to

progressing from there.

Look back to Fig.4; this summarises the most productive inspection career routes

from these, and some other, starting positions. There will always be exceptional cases

– people who signicantly over- or under-achieve but on balance this gure is a good

representation of how things work in reality.

Your choice of training route and the dangerof over-qualification

Your choice of training route depends on where you want it to lead. As with most

jobs, it is temptingly easy to become over-qualied, collecting every qualication

and certicate that you can in the hope that it will paint you into the picture as

the person to be chosen for the best jobs. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work quite like

that. Candidates festooned with paper showers of certicates proclaiming their

excellence at every level, from hands-on weld inspector or NDE technician, through

to rst and second degrees in petrochemical-sounding subjects, and topped with

specialist metallurgical or corrosion knowledge, rarely t well into a practical in-service

inspection role. Over-qualication, particularly across a wide spectrum of academic

levels, raises questions in an employer’s mind about lack of direction, reliability and

the real level of commitment the candidate has to the inspection roles he or she is

looking for.

In the inspection industry, your choice of training route is, therefore, the most

important choice that you will make. It will demonstrate to others your decision-making and direction; over time, the correct choice will move your career along much

more eciently in a way that suits you better.

Fig.12

Inspector training routes

RopeAccess

NDTTechnician

API 653

API 570

API 510

ASME L2

ASME L3

TechnicalAuthority

Senior PlantInspector

ASME L1

PlantInspector


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The two main routes

Fig.12 shows the two main routes that you can take. They are not the same; they

involve dierent skill-sets and these allow informed employers to dierentiate

between the two and favour the one they want.

Alternative routes concentrate on more specialised subjects, dealing with deeper

appreciation of specic inspection topics relating to, for example, FFP studies,

non-intrusive inspection justications and softer topics such as RBI (Risk-Based

Inspection). These are specic skill-sets which not all in-service plant inspectors would

be able, or want, to do well.

Route 1: ASME Plant Inspector training certificate (levels 1, 2, 3)

Despite its title, this programme was developed and initiated in the UK. It is divided

into three levels, based purely on technical knowledge and expertise rather than

anything to do with supervisory or managerial experience. It is a programme which

requires candidates to demonstrate actual practical skills and understanding of the

topics included. It does not use exclusively multi-choice questions as these have

weaknesses at testing delegates’ true technical ability and knowledge.

ASME level 1 ‘Plant Inspector’

This is a 4–5 day course covering the essential groundwork of pressure systems in-

service inspection. While it is a level 1 ‘entry level’ course, it does not contain, nor is it

pitched at, the same level as visual weld inspection and NDT qualication content. It is

much broader and equipment-specic. Fig.13 shows its ‘overall view concept’.

There are no overly restrictive entry criteria for ASME level 1 although most

candidates have some engineering experience connected with inspection or integrity

issues in some way. Academic qualications are not essential as candidates from a

background in NDT, welding, operations/maintenance, etc. traditionally t quite well

into this course, whether they have academic qualications or not.

Fig.13

ASME Plant Inspector

Certified BoilerInspector

API 510Vessels

API 570Pipework

API 653Tanks


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ASME level 1 centres on the requirements of statutory inspection under the relevant

regulations and, in most of our courses, contains hands-on inspection and reporting

exercises on low-pressure vessels and piping components. The course is examined

via a test paper (multi-choice and descriptive questions) plus an assessed sample

inspection report. Successful candidates receive certicates awarded by ASME.

About 50–60% of delegates nd the ASME level 1 sucient for their needs and CV

prole and will not want, or need, to progress to a higher level.

ASME Plant Inspector level 2 ‘Senior Plant Inspector’

ASME Plant Inspector level 2 is much harder than level 1. It contains the following sixtopics which are studied in some depth in a 4-day intensive course:

• Pressure equipment design codes and their margins

• Simple FFP assessment of corroded pressure components

• Inspection periods

• Non-intrusive inspection and its justication

• Temporary and permanent weld repairs to pressure equipment

• Critical corrosion mechanisms, including sour service

It is examined by a 3-hour exam of six narrative questions requiring written

descriptive answers. The exam is held at the end of the course. Candidates are

assessed on their technical knowledge and experience. Successful candidates receive

certicates awarded by ASME.

The pass mark is 70% and the chances of achieving a pass using guesswork, learningby rote or regurgitating the content of the course notes parrot-fashion are next

to zero.

ASME level 2 entry requirements

We require that entrants to ASME level 2 demonstrate a certain level of competence.

This may be either:

• Passing ASME level 1 or a comparable entry-level plant inspection course.

Pure weld inspection/NDT qualications from CSWIP/PCN etc. sources are not

considered eligible for entry to this course

• CV assessment – you must be able to demonstrate previous pressure systems

inspection experience at the necessary level. Achievement of IEng/CEng status is

an asset but BEng/MSc qualications on their own, unless combined with relevant

experience, are given no special consideration

ASME Plant Inspector level 3 ‘Technical Authority’

This is the highest level, covering advanced inspection-related topics such as technical

disputes, expert witness reports, technical guarantee/insurance claims, etc. Only a

small percentage of inspection engineers will progress to this level. The examination

comprises complex written exercises and case study/expert reporting work requiring

good written and language skills combined with wide engineering experience.

Entry to level 3 is only via ASME level 2, personal recommendation, or our rst-hand

knowledge of a candidate’s experience and abilities.

The ASME Plant Inspector certicate programme is the best-attended course run

by Edif ERA in the UK and some overseas countries. Progression to ASME level 2, in

particular, is seen as being one of the most eective ways to identify inspectors who

have the experience, technical knowledge and reporting ability to perform well ininspection positions of higher responsibility.


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Route 2: The API 510/570/653 certification programmes

The American Petroleum Institute (API) certication scheme for in-service inspectors

goes under the grand name of its Individual Certication Programme (ICP). Developed

in the USA, it is available in various countries in the world, including the UK. It was

originally intended for inspectors working in the upstream and downstream oil

industry although much of its technical approach adapts well to other petrochemical

and general process industries.

It is used extensively in the USA ( it is a legal requirement in many states for inspectors

to be certied) and in other countries that use API/ASME codes. In countries where it

is not a legal requirement, it just has the status of being recognised as a ‘benchmark’standard for certication of inspectors.

Owing to their origin in the USA, the API 510/570/653 programmes are concerned

only with the verbatim written content of these code documents and other listed

US supporting documents. The examinations then act purely to test the ability of

candidates to answer a bank of multi-choice questions, based on the wording of the

code documents.

How many ICPs are there?

There are three main ICPs, each linked to a specic set of API codes relating to the

type of equipment covered. They are (see Figs.12 and 13):

• API 510: Pressure vessel inspector

• API 570: Pipework inspector

• API 653: Storage tank inspector

These three main certication programmes have been established for many years.

There are also a few less well-known ones – qualications for ultrasonic examiners

(QUTE) and API 936 (certication for refractory personnel) are two of them, limited

mainly for use in the USA.

Which industries recognise API inspector certification?

The API organisation has its roots in the US petrochemical industry but some other

large-scale process industries around the world recognise API inspector certication.

This is because many of the vessels and pipework systems used are built to the

ASME/API codes that form the foundation of the inspector certication examinations.

API-certied inspectors can, therefore, be found in:

• Rening/petrochemicals

• Oshore/onshore oil and gas industries

• Power utilities

• General process industry

What is the recognition of API certification in the UK/Europe?

The recognition of API inspector certication in the UK and Europe has increased over

the past few years. Two reasons for this are:

• Increasing ownership of oshore facilities and onshore power/process plants by US

companies who are used to recognising API certication

• Recognition that the API ICP is eective at identifying inspectors who can read code

clauses in detail, if that is a skill that is required

How do I become API certified?

In theory, to become certied as an API certied inspector, all you have to do is meet

the API entry requirements and then pass the 8-hour examination. In practice, unless

you have full familiarity with the relevant codes (1000+ pages), you will struggle unless

you prepare for the examination by enrolling on a training course.

The choice is yours. If you attend a training course, it will teach you about the

philosophy and style of the codes, and the way the exam questions are written, test

you using mock exams, etc., and prepare you to take the 8-hour API exam. Some

people decide they don’t need this and make their best attempts on their own.


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When and where are the examinations held?

The API examinations are held around the world on scheduled dates in March, June,

September and December every year. Candidates book in advance to attend an

examination session at which they sit the examinations for either API 570, 510 or 653.

The exam application follows onerous US-style rules and procedures with fairly strict

identity and qualications checks.

As all API 510/570/653 examinations are on the same day, you cannot sit more than

one at the same time. Many of the examination sessions are organised with API

through a training provider, enabling candidates to sit for the examination either

immediately after they have completed the exam preparation training course or

within a short time.

What is the technical content of the API 570/510/653 examinations?

The technical contents of the examinations are well dened and cover exclusively

API and ASME codes and standards. The content of the exam preparation training

courses reects the scope of the examinations in order to prepare the delegates to

sit the exam.

API examination entry requirements?

API set minimum entry requirements for candidates who want to sit for the

570/510/653 exams. This is based largely on the way that things work in the USA.

The general principle is that candidates must be ‘employed by or under contract

to an authorised inspection agency or owner/user organisation’. In practice, this is

less onerous than it sounds and inspectors in Europe or elsewhere who work undercontract (self-employed or limited company) seem to be generally considered eligible.

There is a minimum experience requirement of between 1 to 5 years, depending on

your level of technical qualications.

The Edif Training API ICP training programmes

As an established provider of inspection training courses, Edif ERA oer API

570/510/653 training programmes for API exams held in the UK and selected other

countries. These programmes are written and delivered by UK presenters and cover

all the skills required to sit for the API examinations.

What is the format of the training programme?

The programme consists of two parts:

• Part 1: Preliminary on-line learning training modules

• Part 2: A 5+2-day full-time ‘residential’ classroom course, followed by the relevant

API exam

Our rst-time pass rate is 95%+, compared to a worldwide average of 55–60%. We

achieve this by assessing carefully those who we accept on this route of our training

courses and ensuring they put in the necessary eort to pass the exam. If we think

you are not suitable for this route, we will recommend an alternative route rather

than encourage you to waste your time and money.

Route 3: Specialist technical courses

Inspectors who attend our more specialised technical courses fall into three

main groups:

• Qualied engineers who want to learn specic skills to use in their current role.

They are less interested in the ASME or API certicate routes as they are alreadyhighly technically qualied and have achieved a senior position by other means

• Inspectors who have already been on either the ASME or API certicate routes and

need to ll specic holes in their technical knowledge

• Technicians who require specic training in a separate subject and have no

ambitions to go down inspector certicate route (pressure relief valve the

inspection/maintenance technicians, are a good example)


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What are the specialist courses?

The main specialist courses we run at Edif ERA are shown in the list below. These

have achieved regular attendance over many years and proved benecial in providing

delegates with the skills they require.

• Inspection and maintenance of PRVs: ASME certication course

• The UK Pressure System Safety Regulations (PSSRs)

• Practical use of API 579 (tness-for-service) assessments

• Non-Intrusive Inspection (NII) to DNV-RP-G103

• Introduction to risk-based-inspection: API 580/581; ASME certication course

• Pressure equipment code design

• ASME PCC-2: Pipework repairs

• Certied boiler inspector training and exam

We run all of these both as scheduled public courses and in various combinations

and permutations as in-house courses for individual client companies; 60–80 per year.

Other supplementary courses we run in this category, mainly in-house courses on

request, are:

• Root cause analysis

• Technical report writing

• Introduction to in-service inspection (non-ASME certicate)

• Thickness checking of pipes/vessels

Conclusion

Taken together, these routes make up the majority of paths taken by technicians

and engineers from all backgrounds who become inspectors. Although the routes

themselves require dierent backgrounds and involve dierent types of people, the

technical skills that have to be acquired to do the job of inspection don’t vary too

much. You can acquire the formal qualications you need via either the ASME Plant

Inspector (Route 1) or API 510/570/653 ICP scheme (Route 2). Each has its specic

features and positive and negative points. ASME level 1 has a hands-on training

element and ASME level 2 gives merit to descriptive aspects of inspection reports.

ASME level 3 ‘Technical Authority’ is the hardest course there is. The API ICP exams

are 100% US code orientated, written in US style, and have a huge syllabus, not all

of which may be necessary in your own day-to-day work. They are well accepted

worldwide by those who like the scheme but for some people they are not the best

place to start.

Specialist courses are vocational and useful but, again, they are not a starting

point for your inspection training. Most people come to these after attending

our other courses.

And then, of course, you need engineering and inspection experience. The more you

get, the more employable you will become.


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54

Engineering inspection careers: some advice for new entrants

11. Engineering inspection careers:

some advice for new entrants

Introduction: what is an inspection engineer?

You can hear and read long, opinionated but largely inconclusive arguments as

to what the title ‘inspection engineer’ actually means. For every view that the title

should be limited to those with a certain level of qualications or who have attained aprescribed level of Institution membership, there is a contrary one that says it should

relate equally to those who can prove a level of practical or craft skill or demonstrate

a number of years of inspection experience.

Unlike some countries where the designation is better dened, the situation in

the UK remains liberal and self-regulated. In many industries, the titles ‘inspector’

and ‘inspection engineer’ are used freely and interchangeably, without too much

chaos being caused. Older, more t raditional industries often have more denitive

internal understanding of what the titles mean to them. This owes more to their own

blinkered hierarchical structure and heritage, than to any technical interpretation that

they really ascribe to the terms. In this older view of the world, whether you are called

‘inspector’ or ‘engineer’ paints, to them, a picture of whether or not you sit in an oce

playing with spreadsheets or go out on site and get your hands dirty, what you wear

and how much you get paid.

Looking back in time to the start of it all, it becomes clear that job titles and

delineations are much more articial than they appear. The earliest engineers

conceived the ideas, designed their innovative steam engines, bridges and ships,

raised the funds and inspected many of the parts themselves. This was born of

necessity because there weren’t any ready-trained inspectors waiting to understand

others’ ideas and do the job for them. Once underway, however, the industry

matured quite quickly and separate job roles soon started to crystallise out, driven by

peoples’ preference to concentrate on things that they naturally did best.

Over the last 100 years or so, with increased maturity of the industrial society, the

division of labour has continued, each engineering specialism soon fragmenting into

several sub-specialisms of its own, and so on. This is why the argument as to what

exactly delineates an inspector from an engineer has no real answer, and probably

never will have. It is simply too dicult to draw a line in the sand, within such a large

and varied continuum of skills, on which everyone will agree.

Assuming you have no wish to spend the next 40 or so years worrying about a

question to which you know there is no answer, here is another way to look at it.

Think of inspectors and inspection engineers as all being part of the wide spectrum of

the world of inspecting things. A spectrum has no gaps between its colours, each one

leads seamlessly on to the next. Now think what it would look like viewed in black andwhite rather than colour – they are now all the same colour (grey) dierentiated from

each other only by the depth of their shade of grey.

What if the shades of grey represented technical diculty ? The light grey shades

would represent inspection job roles that are easier to learn, with the dark ones

being progressively more dicult. Diculty might also be associated with not only the

technical depth of the subject or role but also the time it would take to learn to do it

well. At no point in this continuum from white (easy) to black (dicult) could we draw

a denitive line dividing ‘light’ from ‘dark’, all we can say is that the spectrum consists

of varying degrees of lightness and darkness and that every shade forms part of the

complete picture. So here’s our conclusion:

• Generic job titles such as ‘inspector’ and ‘inspection engineer’ cannot, realistically,

be accurately dened – they are simply parts of the continuous spectrum of job

roles in the inspection industry

However,

• One way to view the dierence in roles is to consider how dicult each one is and

how long it would take to learn to do it fully (and properly)


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Engineering inspection careers: some advice for new entrants

A rough guide to inspection industry breakdown

There are many hundreds of dierent industry types, roles, job descriptions and

specialisms in the world of inspection engineering, spread over a multitude of

dierent industry sectors. There are various systems that attempt to categorise these

into Standard Industry Classications (SIC) using code numbers or letters but they are

complicated and don’t always t well with each other.

Simplistically, you can think of the inspection industry, and the job roles within

it, as a matrix. To keep this matrix to any sort of manageable size means that it

needs to be generalised – providing an overall picture rather than a detailed or

comprehensive analysis.

Fig.14 shows the matrix. The more basic industries lie near the bottom, rising to the

increasingly complex and technologically advanced ones towards the top. Although

pure science elements exist at all these levels, they become more prevalent and used

in greater detail in those industries near the top of the matrix. There is no implication

of value or worth to industry in the position of any entry in the vertical scale, it is

just a crude grading based on the overall complexity and resultant diculty of the

subject. The horizontal axis of the matrix is dierent – this shows the basic allocation

of inspection job roles. These are equally applicable to all the industry sectors in the

vertical scale – there may be a few dierences but the basic breakdown is much the

same for all. The horizontal axis is based on a chronological (time) scale running left

to right. Unlike the vertical axis, the dierences in complexity and diculty are less

well spread across the horizontal axis. Design appraisal before manufacture sits

alone as a discrete skill-set but the others are fairly wel

Documents

Edif Plant Inspector Career and Training Guide