Tie-in from POWID Nuclear Sessions
Coincidentally, a presentation from the colocated ISA Power Industry Symposium (POWID), echoed several of our points. James H. Flowers of Southern Nuclear Operating Co., Birmingham, Ala., in his paper and presentation, "Non-Technical Issues Impacting Digital Upgrades," referred to the "development of a hybrid digital expert who is trained in software and communications as well as mechanical and electrical theory." Referring to nuclear plants, Flowers noted that few managers have a strong background in instrumentation and controls (I&C), much less digital controls. This makes it difficult for them to make funding decisions related to digital technology.
But the issue is acute at the engineering level, too. Flowers cited the following example: A plant installs a new transmitter. An I&C designer, with independent verification, develops the design and orders material. Maintenance sets up a test plan and sets up the instrument. This is all rather mundane. Now take the transmitter and send its output to a digital control system. This complicates things. People familiar with traditional I&C design, installation, and maintenance are unfamiliar with writing software, testing it, and establishing communications between the transmitter and processor. Those with the software and network skills are usually located in the IT or computing department.
Specialized training is required to cultivate hybrid digital experts, and that training must cover the different phases of the equipment or system life cycle — design, testing, implementation, and maintenance. Unfortunately, there are few, if any, education or training programs that integrate all of these skills. Therefore, organizations have to develop digital hybrid experts internally through creative means. Some ideas are:
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Create digital groups and work practice areas, not just for software portions of projects but for maintenance, design, and operations as well.
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Apply ISA, Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), and company or internally developed training classes.
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Read and understand regulatory guides and licensing requirements from IEEE, the Nuclear Energy Institute, EPRI, the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
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Develop industry-wide programs to support digital applications, especially in software development, software testing, software quality assurance, configuration management, cyber-security, and electromagnetic interference and radio frequency interference.
Although nuclear plants lag behind fossil and other plants in digital applications, many of Flowers’ ideas are just as relevant to other plants (see p. 29 for more details). In fact, many software companies supplying to the fossil power industry are inhibited by the lack of domain experts on their staffs and the lack of digital experts on the plant owner/operator staff. This is an inter-organizational gap on the fossil side rather than the intra-organizational gap to which Flowers referred. And no one needs to explain to power plant staff the organizational and cultural gaps between operations and maintenance and the corporate IT departments.
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