Editing Alarm management (section)

{{Short description|Usability factor in alarm systems}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2015}}
{{More citations needed|date=April 2014}}

'''Alarm management''' is the application of [[human factors and ergonomics]] along with [[instrumentation engineering]] and [[systems thinking]] to manage the design of an [[alarm system]] to increase its [[usability]].  Most often the major usability problem is that there are too many alarms annunciated in a plant upset, commonly referred to as [[alarm flood]] (similar to an [[interrupt storm]]), since it is so similar to a flood caused by excessive rainfall input with a basically fixed [[drainage]] output capacity.  However, there can also be other problems with an alarm system such as poorly designed alarms, improperly set  alarm points, ineffective annunciation, unclear alarm messages, etc. Poor alarm management is one of the leading causes of unplanned downtime, contributing to over $20B{{citation needed|date=June 2024}} in lost production every year, and of major industrial incidents. Developing good alarm management practices is not a discrete activity, but more of a continuous process (i.e., it is more of a journey than a destination).<ref>{{citation |title=ALARM MANAGEMENT AND ISA-18 – A JOURNEY, NOT A DESTINATION |last1=Stauffer |first1=Todd |last2=Sands |first2=Nicholas P. |last3=Dunn |first3=Donald G. |publisher=exida |location=Sellersville, PA}}</ref>