Hi All, Just read an interesting article on the recent introduction of an ISA standard which provides guidance on the management of Independent Protection Layers - Low Integrity Protection Layers: ANSI/ISA-84.91.03-2025 Explained. This is an interesting subject as IPL's are an essential aspect when working out the target RRF of a SIF, however they are often forgotten about once the plant goes back into operation. Some sites do manage the maintenance of IPL's differently to non-safety loops, via a maintained IPL register, IPL validation and more stringent testing routines. However this is not always the case and a lot of the time IPL's just fall into the normal maintenance system as this article suggests. Would be interesting to hear from the group your thoughts on this subject .....

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Something that always makes me pause when reviewing designs… Proof test coverage that somehow always ends up being 100% effective. On paper it looks great. The numbers work nicely. The SIL calculation passes comfortably. But in the real world I always find myself thinking: Can we really detecting every dangerous failure with that test? In my experience, this is a major cause of rework. If the design progresses to the point where commissioning documents are written and then a FSA or design review reveals overly optimistic proof test coverage it’s a lot of work to correct. Anyone else experiencing this?

What is the best way to know the failure modes of components? Manufacturers usually don't provide failure modes and failure modes in databases as NPRD are usually very ambiguous.