Root Cause Analysis in Process-based Industries

Root Cause Analysis
in
Process-based Industries


Root Cause Analysis is something that is not yet taught in schools, colleges or in universities. There is a tendency to rely on intuition and the experience of engineers and team leaders when running problem solving tasks.

In process-based industries, a delay in identifying the real cause for a process problem means a loss of production material and revenue, and sometimes even diminished company reputation or market share.

The intuitive way of problem solving is by a trial and error approach. An inexperienced team, using this approach will first try their best guess followed by the next best guess and so on. This can be very frustrating and time consuming, as the team may work very hard only to have to start all over again.

Sometimes, by being experienced and knowledgeable, we lose the ability to be unbiased. It is not infrequent for teams with knowledgeable and experienced persons to "lock" on a model, while relying on partial indications. From this point, the team tends to overemphasize data that is in agreement with their theory and dismiss all other data.

This book provides understanding and knowledge about Root Cause Analysis to those who need to face process and equipment problems in process-based industries. However, anyone who deals with Root Cause Analysis in any discipline may find parts of this book useful and worth reading.