BASF 2004 Verbund Turnaround Success
In February the BASF Geismar site brought down all units for what was called the "Verbund Turnaround. INTERNATIONAL MAINTENANCE COMPANY, L.L.C. and BASF approached this challenge in the partnering fashion that has been the hallmark of our long-term relationship. 

This turnaround, unlike any other that BASF has experienced, was an unusual effort because of the shutdown of every unit in the plant.   Scope included the Plant Steam System plus 11 operating units -  Acetylene, TDI, 14BD, MDI 1, MDI 2, Carboxy, Poly 1, Poly 2, Aniline 1, Aniline 2 and Amines. 

The reason for this turnaround was triggered by the need for the shutdown of the steam system, which had not been taken out of service for comprehensive maintenance for over 35 years.  Outages for the 11 operating units had to be coordinated around the 10 day steam system window.  Additional coordination was required between neighboring plants Vulcan Chemicals, Rubicon, and Air Products.  These sites are reciprocating suppliers and consumers of BASF’s feeds and products and affect the full operation and production capacity of  BASF’s plant.

INTERNATIONAL MAINTENANCE COMPANY, L.L.C. played a major role in this effort as the company responsible for planning, scheduling, and coordinating work for all contractors.  The impact of each unit’s outage on all other units made it crucial that all milestone dates be met for system prep, shutdown, maintenance, re-commissioning and start up.  This required that the effort be managed as one large turnaround,  which would allow for the movement of resources to respond to potential discovery work or delays in system readiness.   To make this possible,  INTERNATIONAL MAINTENANCE COMPANY, L.L.C. planning group utilized Turner management systems to estimate, plan, progress and schedule all work being performed.  This resulted in a smooth, well-coordinated shutdown of the entire BASF site.  All  “Job Performance Milestones” were achieved, including system turnovers, efficiency, work performance, budget projections, steam system shutdown and re-commissioning.  This was an enormous and successful effort.

INTERNATIONAL MAINTENANCE COMPANY, L.L.C. and other Turner companies executed over 119,000 work-hours during the turnaround window.  INTERNATIONAL MAINTENANCE COMPANY, L.L.C. wishes to acknowledge Turner sister companies SWS, Nichols, IPS, TITC, and TIS who helped to make the BASF 2004 Verbund Turnaround a great success.

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