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Uncertainty Representation and Propagation in Maintenance Performance Assessment
In this chapter, we consider the problem of uncertainty representation and propagation in the context of maintenance performance assessment. The application is in part based on Baraldi, Compare, and Zio (2012) and Baraldi, Compare, and Zio (2013a).
9.1 Maintenance Performance Assessment
In the last few decades, the relevance of maintenance in several sectors of industry has increased in influence on both productivity and safety. For example, maintenance represents a major portion of the total production cost of non-fossil-fuel energy production plants (nuclear, solar, wind, etc.) and its optimization is fundamental for the economic competitiveness of such plants (Zio and Compare, 2013).
In general, the goal of effective maintenance planning is the optimization of production and plant availability, in a way that guarantees safety and respects the associated regulatory requirements (Zio, 2009). For this, several approaches to maintenance modeling, optimization, and management have been proposed in the literature. Usually, these approaches are divided into two main groups: corrective maintenance and scheduled maintenance.
Under the corrective maintenance strategy, the components are operated until failure; then, repair or renovation actions are performed. This is the oldest approach to maintenance and is nowadays still adopted in some industries, especially for equipment which is neither safety critical ...
