Cimage - Nuclear Case Study 2 - British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. (BNFL)

Managing Plant Records at British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.
Managing Plant Records at British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. Why is Document Management important in Nuclear Power Stations? How can a Cimage Document Management system help? British Energy use Cimage to manage 'Configured Set' documentation Further information

In mid 1995, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. (BNFL) embarked on the implementation of a Cimage solution for managing plant records. The initial target was some 2 million drawings related to the reprocessing and waste management plant at Sellafield in Cumbria. This 11.7km² site employs several thousand people who operate and maintain equipment contained in over 400 buildings. Microfilm copies of drawings were held in drawing registries at Sellafield so, to get prints, plant engineers had to travel or await delivery.
Minor plant changes are done by Sellafield Design Services who, when needing a master document copy for revision needed to await its arrival from the Sellafield main registry or from the BNFL Engineering Division located 200km away. Major plant changes and new plant construction are carried out by the Engineering division so the two sites were constantly needing to hand over master drawings from one site to the other and then back again as needed, removing and restoring them to their different computerized drawing control systems. Approval of plant changes meant further routing of paper, sometimes between sites or between BNFL and their engineering contractors. Once a drawing was changed, new microfilms needed to be made and distributed. Most drawings were available only on paper or film. With repeated handling and modification these deteriorated and needed re-drawing. The consequences of this situation were that users of drawings wasted time seeking or awaiting them. A simple 2 minute drawing change typically took 2 weeks and BNFL bore the cost of over 80 people in the drawing registries at Sellafield and Risley as well as the cost of secure storage space for 1,250 filing cabinets.

The implementation of a Cimage system transformed drawing management at BNFL.

Cimage Document Manager now holds over 450,000 of the most used drawings and new drawings that are added as they arrive from Risley or contractors.

Staff at the plant can now retrieve drawings in less than 30 seconds when before it took hours or days and they always know that they are getting the most current version.

A Cimage Document Manager at Risley allows the capture of drawings from their engineers and contractors that can easily be handed over to the Sellafield system. A second database at Risley provides back-up against failure. Cimage's Remote database Manager ensures the two databases are kept identical and, when Sellafield and Risley collaborate on a project it ensures that only one party can be working on a drawing at any time.

Integration of the system with AutoCAD provides a productive working environment, whilst workflow control speeds up, and assures integrity of, the change process.

BNFL have measured cost savings of over $450,000 per year and expect further return on investment as they expand the use of the system.

The also have the peace of mind that comes from being in control.

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Managing Plant Records at British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.

Managing Plant Records at British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.

Managing Plant Records at
British Nuclear Fuels Ltd.