Page 16 - Boiler Operator’s Handbook

Chapter 1

Operating Wisely

waste of time, some did more harm than good, and oth-
If it were not for the power of the human mind with its ers were downright dangerous. Most of those actions
ability to process information and produce concepts that could be traced to instructions for situations that no
have never existed before we would be limited to living longer exist or to a misunderstanding by the operator of
out our lives like the other species that reside on this what was going on. To learn to operate wisely you have
earth. We would act as we always have and never make to know why you do things and what happens when
any progress or improve our lives and our environment. you do the wrong thing. This book tries to cover both.
We could, of course, do only those things expected When you understand why you do things you’re more
of us and be content with the rewards for doing so. Read likely to do them correctly.
on if you’re not contented with simply being and doing. When you have an opportunity to make a mistake,
it’s always nice to know how someone else screwed up.
As Sam Levenson once said, “You must learn from the
WHY WISELY? mistakes of others. You can’t possibly live long enough
to make them all yourself.” Many mistakes are de-
Actually I intended the title of this book to be scribed in the following pages so you will, hopefully, not
“Operating Wisely” because there are many books with repeat them.
the title of “Boiler Operator’s Handbook” available to- Two other reasons for this book are the environ-
day. Some are small, some are large, and all have good ment and economics. If every boiler operator applied
information in them. If you don’t already have one or a few of the wise actions described in this book there
two, I’m surprised. This isn’t just another boiler opera- would be a huge reduction in energy consumption and,
tor’s handbook. However, the publisher wanted to call as a result, a dramatic improvement in our environment.
it a boiler operator’s handbook to be certain its content You can earn your salary by proper operation that keeps
was properly described. Those other books describe the fuel, electricity, and water costs as low as possible while
plant and equipment but don’t really talk about oper- still providing the necessary heat to the building and
ating, and in many cases they fail to explain why you processes. Wise people don’t do damage to their envi-
should do certain things and why you shouldn’t do oth- ronment or waste the boss’ money. I hope to give you all
ers. the wisdom I gained over fifty years in this business so
It’s said that “any automatic control will revert to you can operate wisely.
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the level of competence of the operator.” It’s clear that
engineers can design all sorts of neat gadgets but they
won’t work any better than the operator allows. What PRIORITIZING
they always seem to miss is the fact that they never told
the operator what the gadget was supposed to do and The first step in operating wisely is to get your
how to make sure it does it. Lacking that information, priorities in order. Imagine taking a poll of all the boiler
the operator reverts to a strategy that keeps the plant plant operators you know and asking them what is the
running. Hopefully this book will provide you with a most important thing they have to do. What would they
way to figure out what the engineer was trying to ac- list first? I’m always getting the reply that it’s keeping
complish so you can make the gadget work if it does do the steam pressure up, or something along those lines.
a better job. In some cases you’re right, the darn thing Why? The answer is rather simple; in most cases, the
is a waste of time and effort, but hopefully you won’t only time an operator hears from the boss is when the
dismiss them out of hand anymore. New gadgets and pressure is lost or everyone is complaining about the
methods are tools you can put to use. cold or lost production. Keep the pressure up and you
Over the years I’ve observed operators doing a lot will not have any complaints to deal with, so it gets first
of things that I considered unwise; some were simply a billing. Right? … Wrong!
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