POWER April 2011 - 71

BENCHMARKING
6. Forced outage measures. Although only six forced outage performance measures
were reported at the plant level, the same ones were favored at the fleet level, although in
much lower numbers. The favorite fleet-level metric was safety performance, although only
25% of the participating fleets reported using this metric. Source: EUCG
Plant
Safety performance
Work scope variance
Outage budget
Rework factor
Schedule compliance (by execution phase)
Schedule compliance (break-to-breaker)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Number of companies
12
Fleet
The EUCG: Fostering
7. Safety measures. The most common plant-level safety measures reported are also the
top priority at the fleet level. However, another dozen safety measures were reported by five
or fewer utilities at the fleet level. Another noticeable difference between the two levels is that
housekeeping assessments and safety meeting attendance are used at the plant level but not
at the fleet level. Source: EUCG
Plant
First aid cases
Lost work days/cases
OSHA recordable rate
Safety " near misses "
Days away, restricted or transferred
OSHA lost time rate
Vehicle accidents
Contractor recordables
Number of human performance events
Fire protection system assessments
Number of safety observations audits
OSHA severity rate
Injury-free days/rate
Housekeeping assessments
Safety meeting attendance
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
Number of companies
8. Environmental measures. Reporting results were the most similar at plant and fleet
levels for environmental and safety measures (Figure 7). Strangely, SO2 and NOx emission rates
and opacity exceedances are reported at the fleet level by less than half of the reporting utilities.
Source: EUCG
Plant
SO2 and NOx emission rates
Reportable spills
Number of environmental incidents
Opacity compliance (exceeds/run hours)
Notices of violation
Number of opacity exceedances
Ash recycled vs. landfilled (%)
Amount of hazardous waste generated
Environmental training completed on time
Continuous emissions monitoring system availability
Environmental assessments
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Number of companies
April 2011 | POWER
www.powermag.com
Fleet
Fleet
Industry Excellence
The EUCG is an association for electric utility
professionals that provides a forum in
which utilities can improve their operation
and maintenance practices and construction
performance. Founded in 1973, the EUCG
holds technical conferences and workshops
twice yearly for the purpose of information
exchange. The organization (formerly known
as the Electric Utility Cost Group) is organized
into committees and working groups
by interest area, such as fossil, nuclear, and
hydroelectric plants; transmission and distribution;
safety; and IT.
The EUCG's Fossil Productivity Committee
(FPC) has 32 electric utility members
from the U.S. reporting operating data
on more than 300 individual coal-fired
units. That number represents more than
30% of operating coal plants in the U.S.
The committee also includes members
from six other countries.
One of the EUCG's key activities is developing
process and market benchmarks, unit
reliability strategies, and best-practice applications
to foster performance and cost
excellence within the utility industry and
competitive markets. Ongoing projects include
the Fossil Plant Performance Metrics
study, and earlier benchmarking studies
on plant operator, engineering, and technical
staffing; installed costs of selective
catalytic reduction systems and scrubbers;
and operation and maintenance subjects
such as boiler tube failures. Summaries of
these and other FPC benchmarking studies
can be found in our online archives at www
.powermag.com.
If you would like to include your plants
in the study database and receive a complete
copy of this or any previous study,
contact the EUCG. A " Data Membership "
entitles utilities to receive the complete
benchmarking data set customized for their
plants. Also, the FPC recently initiated the
development of a combined-cycle/combustion
turbine cost and performance database
that currently has 16 utilities reporting data
on 415 individual units from 93 plants.
The spring 2011 EUCG meeting will be
held April 3-6 at the Marriott City Center in
Charlotte, N.C. For more information about
the EUCG, contact Pat Kovalesky, executive
director, at 623-572-4140, or visit www
.eucg.org.
71

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POWER April 2011

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