Old K says every week – talking about things in the petrochemical design industry. Post 40: The design industry often falls back on empiricism and copying...

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Old K writes every week – Episode 40 on matters related to the petrochemical design industry. In this industry, errors such as empiricism and reliance on existing methods are often made. Engineering design is different from technology development; engineering design is meant to be used in actual construction projects, which require significant investment. Except for a few experimental devices, fatal failures are not permitted in engineering design; therefore, past successful experiences are very important in such design work. As a result, it is also easy to fall into the mistakes of empiricism and copycat behavior – unreasonable or even incorrect practices from the past can be copied outright. Designers who lack a sense of responsibility or ambition are particularly prone to making mistakes due to empiricism and copycat behavior. The errors of empiricism and copycat approaches are mainly manifested in the following aspects: 1) Copying the original drawings verbatim, without making any modifications or adjustments based on the specific conditions of the project itself and the climate conditions of the construction site. 2) The errors from the original drawings were also copied over, resulting in repeated mistakes. For many projects these days, the design institute does not prepare as-built drawings; for some on-site modifications, the institute is either unaware of them, or the design changes are not archived, or because the design changes and the final design documents are stored separately, the institute doesn’t bother to check those changes. I once worked on a project where the on-site workers complained that certain piping errors kept recurring in multiple projects done by that design firm. 3) Unreasonable solutions in the original drawings are not optimized, and such unreasonable solutions remain unchanged. For example, some equipment is oversized, the head of some pumps is set too high, and some designs are not energy-efficient. 4) Over-reliance on the experience feedback from actual production operators. As designers, it is important to pay attention to the feedback and experience from field operators, but thorough analysis is also necessary. Due to the lack of theoretical knowledge among some field operators or for other reasons, they sometimes only consider the surface phenomena and know what to do without understanding why. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct thorough theoretical analysis of the feedback provided by these operators, to identify the underlying causes – whether they are related to the design, the operation, or something else. 5) Over-reliance on foreign process packages, without proactively identifying and modifying unreasonable aspects within them. In short, as a responsible designer, one must have the perseverance to continuously improve design solutions, an innovative mindset, and a high degree of responsibility toward the client. Only in this way can one’s design skills keep improving. Tip: You can enter “Lao K’s Weekly Updates – Insights into the Petrochemical Design Industry” in the website’s search engine to view previous posts