Our consultants have worked in and around control rooms for over twenty-five years. In that time we have provided consulting services to over one hundred sites, including some of the best-known companies in the world:

While no two projects have ever been exactly the same, our control building consulting generally falls into one of three general areas:

Operational Effectiveness Studies

Control Building Feasibility Studies

Control Building Design

Example One: A refinery in Louisiana was preparing to undergo a major re-instrumentation project. As part of the project the consoles for several of the process units were to be relocated into one new and one refurbished control rooms. User Centered Design Services, INC was retained to determine the best location for the new control building, the most effective alignment of process units within the two control buildings, the strategy for accommodating field operators in local shelters, and the functional layouts of all the buildings.

Example Two: A large chemical complex in Texas was compelled by API RP752 (Management of Hazards Associated with Location of Process Plant Buildings) to improve the protection provided to operators. User Centered Design Services, INC was contracted to help determine the advantages and disadvantages of an offsite, centralized control building vs. one or more blast resistant buildings inside the plant.

Example Three: A chemical plant in Europe contracted with User Centered Design Services, INC to help create a shared vision between operators, management, and the engineering contractor selected to design and build its new centralized control building.

Example Four: A petrochemical company on the Gulf Coast, being a defendant in a record lawsuit, retained the services of User Centered Design Services, INC to benchmark their control room operations practices against industry standards. UCDS have completed numerous staffing studies using the latest Complexity Analysis and Risk Assessment Techniques.

Example Five: An Aluminum refinery in Western Australia contracted UCDS to rationalize their control buildings and provide conceptual design and Specification for a Centralized Control Room Building, UCDS was also involved in advertising and guiding an Alarm Management and User Interface re-design

For more information about the findings and recommendations for any of these example projects, please contact us at 623-764-0486.