Does ISO 45001 or AS 4801 require a documented turnaround safety case?

ISO 45001:2018 requires the occupational health and safety management system to identify, assess and control hazards across all activities and to extend to contractors. AS 4801 (Australian standard) applies the same principle in the Australian framework. Turnaround work concentrates high-hazard activities (energy isolation, confined space, working at heights, hot work, LOTO) and elevates contractor headcount, both of which require explicit treatment in the safety management system. A documented turnaround safety case linked to ISO 45001 clauses 6 (hazard identification) and 8 (operational control) is the de facto evidence regulators and insurance assessors expect, and is referenced in the SMRP body of knowledge section 4.5 as the turnaround-specific requirement.

What electrical-safety standards apply to turnaround LOTO work?

In Australia and New Zealand, AS NZS 4836 covers safe working on low-voltage electrical installations, AS NZS 3000 sets installation requirements and AS NZS 3017 sets verification requirements; energy isolation procedures are governed by site-specific LOTO procedures consistent with AS 4024 (machinery safety). In the United States, NFPA 70E covers electrical safety in the workplace including energised-work permits and arc-flash boundaries, and OSHA 1910.147 sets the control of hazardous energy (LOTO) requirements for general industry. Turnaround LOTO procedures should reference the applicable standards explicitly, document an energy-source register per asset and require electrical-safety procedure compliance for every isolation.

When should I lock the scope freeze gate?

SMRP best practice and the typical maintenance estimating literature both target a scope freeze at T-6 months for a major turnaround. The freeze gate marks the point after which any new scope requires executive sponsor sign-off and an explicit critical-path impact assessment. Earlier freezes (T-9 to T-12 months) work for large capital-heavy turnarounds where long-lead procurement dominates; later freezes (T-3 to T-4 months) are sometimes accepted on smaller turnarounds where the critical path is short. Freezes later than T-3 months almost always produce schedule overruns and emergent-scope cost blowouts because the planning chain has insufficient time to absorb late additions.

How is turnaround planning different from preventive maintenance scheduling?

Preventive maintenance scheduling allocates routine PM tasks across the year against in-service equipment with operations continuing. Turnaround planning compresses a 12 to 36 month backlog of inspections, capital work, major overhauls and life-extension projects into a single 10 to 30 day shutdown window, with the plant offline, elevated contractor headcount and stage-gated governance from T-24 months. The disciplines (scope freeze, critical-path scheduling, kitting, isolation, PSSR, commissioning) are specific to the turnaround context and do not apply to routine PM scheduling. The two activities use shared inputs (asset register, work order history, PM schedule) but the planning methodology and governance are distinct.

What KPIs should I track during and after a turnaround?

Core turnaround KPIs are: schedule attainment (planned versus actual duration, target plus or minus 10 percent), cost attainment (planned versus actual cost, target plus or minus 10 percent), scope creep percentage (final scope versus frozen scope, target less than 5 percent), safety performance (TRIFR LTIFR and any high-potential incidents, target zero recordable), critical-path adherence (percent of critical-path jobs on plan), mechanical-completion punchlist count and aging, post-startup reliability (any reactive incidents in the first 30 days that trace to turnaround work), and lessons-learned closure (percent of identified lessons captured and assigned to the next turnaround). These KPIs are the basis for the post-turnaround review with the executive sponsor.

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Free shutdown and startup planning checklist (PDF-ready). Turnaround governance: scope, schedule, isolation, contractors, commissioning. SMRP 4.5 aligned.

Jarrod Milford

Commercial Director

Updated 18 May 2026

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Updated 18 May 2026

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What is a shutdown and startup planning checklist?

A shutdown and startup planning checklist is a master governance document used by a turnaround team to plan, execute and verify a major plant shutdown (turnaround, T A, outage, shut) and the subsequent controlled startup back to normal operations. It covers the full turnaround lifecycle: scope freeze and work-list rationalisation, schedule build to the critical path, contractor mobilisation, energy isolation and permit-to-work readiness, parts kitting and long-lead procurement, safety case and emergency response, execution control and progress reporting, mechanical completion and pre-startup safety review (PSSR), commissioning, performance test and handback to operations. Shutdowns are the single largest concentration of risk, capital and disruption in an asset-intensive operation: a typical heavy industrial turnaround compresses 12 to 36 months of work scope into 10 to 30 days, mobilises a contractor workforce 3 to 10 times normal headcount, costs $5 million to $500 million depending on scale, and routinely overruns on schedule and budget when planning discipline is weak.\n\nThe SMRP Best Practices Body of Knowledge section 4.5 (Shutdown turnaround and outage management) sets out the disciplines that separate predictable turnarounds from cost overruns: a scope freeze at T minus 6 months, a critical-path schedule built bottom-up from estimating norms, a risk-based work-list rationalisation that removes anything that doesnt earn its place in the window, and a stage-gate governance process running from T minus 24 months to startup. Safety is the other dimension that distinguishes good from bad turnarounds. Plant shutdown work concentrates high-hazard activities (energy isolation under AS 4801 and ISO 45001, confined space entry, working at heights, hot work, hazardous-energy LOTO under NFPA 70E for electrical and OSHA 1910.147 in the US), with elevated incident rates if the safety case isnt built into the plan from the start. NFPA 70E specifically requires documented electrical-safety procedures and energised-work permits, and ISO 45001 requires the safety management system to extend across contractors. The planning checklist is the document that proves the plan was structured, the gates were held, and execution had the inputs it needed to succeed - and it is the document the executive sponsor, the insurance assessor and the regulator will ask for if anything goes wrong.

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Benefits of using this shutdown and startup planning checklist

Predictable schedule and cost: stage-gated planning from T-24 months to startup, with scope freeze at T-6 months, delivers turnarounds that finish within plus or minus 10 percent of schedule and budget against the 30 to 50 percent overruns typical of un-gated turnarounds.
Safety case built into the plan: explicit coverage of AS 4801, ISO 45001 and NFPA 70E requirements in the planning phase, not as an afterthought, removes the structural drivers of the elevated turnaround injury rate.
Contractor integration: a single planning standard for in-house and contractor scope eliminates the silo gap where contractor schedules, parts and permits collide with the host schedule on day one.
Scope discipline: a documented work-list rationalisation forces every job to earn its place in the window, reducing scope by 20 to 30 percent and freeing critical-path resource for genuinely needed work.
Faster startup with fewer surprises: mechanical completion checklists, PSSR walkdowns and structured commissioning steps surface defects before live operation, cutting first-week reactive incidents.
Audit-ready documentation: the populated checklist is the evidence document for insurers, regulators and the executive review committee, replacing anecdotal post-mortems with a structured turnaround record.

Benefits of digitising forms in MapTrack

When you move your plans from paper to MapTrack, you get:

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Edit forms later without reprinting.
Restrict permissions (who can view, complete or approve).
Build forms with AI (describe what you need and MapTrack suggests the form).
Trigger work orders automatically when a fault is logged during an inspection.
Track service intervals by hours, kilometres or calendar date in one place.
Attach supplier invoices and parts receipts to each maintenance record.

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What to include in a shutdown and startup planning checklist

This shutdown and startup planning checklist covers 10 key areas:

Turnaround charter and governance: turnaround manager, executive sponsor, host site, planning team, contractor leads, governance committee, stage gates from T-24 months to startup with go/no-go criteria at each gate.
Scope register and rationalisation: master work list from operations, maintenance, inspections, projects and HSE, with each item risk-rated, justified against the in-window criteria, and either accepted or deferred to next opportunity.
Critical-path schedule: bottom-up schedule built from estimating norms (typical maintenance estimating reference), with critical path identified, float documented, and integration of in-house and contractor scope on a single plan.
Contractor mobilisation: contractor selection, scope of work, contract type, mobilisation date, demobilisation date, supervision ratios, induction, qualification verification and host-site safety integration.
Isolation, permit-to-work and LOTO readiness: energy-source register per asset, isolation plan, permit-to-work register, LOTO procedure references, electrical safety procedures aligned to NFPA 70E (or local equivalent), confined-space entry plans.
Parts kitting and long-lead procurement: long-lead items identified at T-12 months, ordered against the freeze, parts kits per work order pre-staged to the SMRP 6.2 standard, contingency stock for emergent scope.
Safety case and emergency response: turnaround-specific risk register, safety case aligned to ISO 45001 and AS 4801, emergency response plan extension for elevated headcount, gas testing regime, fire watch standard, MEWP and crane lift plans.
Mechanical completion and PSSR: mechanical completion punch-list per work order, pre-startup safety review walkdown protocol, sign-off authority, defect closure tracking and conditional-startup authorisation if punchlist remains.
Commissioning and performance test: equipment-by-equipment commissioning sequence, performance acceptance criteria, instrument loop checks, control-system tests, handback-to-operations criteria and performance test run.
Lessons learned and KPI capture: turnaround duration versus plan, cost versus budget, scope creep percentage, schedule attainment, safety performance (TRIFR LTIFR), rework and post-startup incidents captured for the next turnaround cycle.

How to use this shutdown and startup planning checklist

Build the turnaround charter and lock the stage-gate schedule at T-24 to T-18 months. Name the turnaround manager and executive sponsor, set the high-level scope envelope, agree the duration target and budget envelope with operations and finance, and book the stage-gate review dates. The earliest gates (concept, scope build, schedule build, scope freeze) set the entire trajectory of the turnaround - work that arrives later than the stage gate disrupts every downstream activity.
Compile and rationalise the master work list at T-12 to T-9 months. Pull every candidate job from operations, maintenance, inspections (pressure vessel, electrical, structural), projects and HSE. Risk-rate each job (must do in window, should do in window, can defer), challenge the value and the duration of every job, and either accept or defer to the next opportunity. The objective is to enter the schedule build with a defensible list, not the unfiltered combined wish-list.
Build the critical-path schedule and freeze the scope at T-6 months. Build the schedule bottom-up from the work list using standard estimating norms (typical heavy industrial norms: turnaround duration is a function of critical-path job duration, not headcount). Identify the critical path, document float on the next two paths, and integrate contractor scope on the same plan. Hold the scope freeze gate at T-6 months - scope added after freeze requires executive sponsor sign-off and an explicit critical-path impact assessment.
Mobilise contractors, kit parts and finalise the safety case at T-3 to T-1 months. Issue contractor packages, complete inductions and qualification checks, mobilise long-lead parts, kit parts per the SMRP 6.2 procedure, complete the energy isolation plan, validate the permit-to-work register, finalise the emergency response plan for elevated headcount and run the safety case review. Walk the contractor leads through the host-site standards and run a desktop simulation of the first 48 hours.
Execute, complete mechanical completion and PSSR, then commission and hand back. During execution, run the daily turnaround governance forum (T-time progress, safety statistics, scope creep, critical-path status), close out work orders to mechanical completion, walk the pre-startup safety review with the operations team, address punch-list items per the PSSR protocol, commission in a controlled sequence and run the performance test. Sign back to operations against the documented handback criteria and capture lessons learned for the next turnaround.

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How often should you complete this plan?

Shutdown frequency depends on asset class and process. Continuous-process plants (oil and gas, petrochemical, power, primary metals) plan major turnarounds on cycles of 2 to 6 years, set by inspection statutory intervals (pressure vessel, vessel relief, fired heater, electrical compliance) and OEM service intervals on the largest rotating equipment. Mining processing plants typically run annual mid-life shutdowns plus a major turnaround every 4 to 6 years. Manufacturing plants run planned shutdowns annually or biannually, with a major capital shutdown every 5 to 10 years. The planning effort itself spans 18 to 36 months for a major turnaround: T-24 months governance and concept, T-12 months scope build, T-6 months scope freeze, T-3 months mobilisation, execution, then 1 to 3 months post-turnaround lessons learned and as-built capture. In MapTrack, the planning checklist, scope register and progress dashboard live against the site turnaround record, so each subsequent turnaround starts with the previous turnarounds lessons learned instead of from scratch.

Frequently asked questions

Applicable regulatory standards

This template aligns with the following regulations and standards:

ISO 45001:2018 (Occupational health and safety management systems)
AS 4801:2001 (OHS management systems)
NFPA 70E-2024 (Standard for Electrical Safety in the Workplace)
OSHA 29 CFR 1910.147 (The control of hazardous energy LOTO)
SMRP Best Practices Body of Knowledge section 4.5 (Shutdown turnaround and outage management)
AS NZS 4836:2023 (Safe working on or near low-voltage electrical installations)

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