Plant insulation survey reports, from a technician's notes and photos to a repair list for your estimator.

Insulation in a plant fails a section at a time, and no drawing shows where. Someone walks it with a flashlight, a phone and a notebook, writing down what the line is, where it runs, how much is bad, what's wrong with it, and what it will take to reach. Back at the office, your estimator turns those notes and photos into a repair list the plant can act on.

In the test, AI reads copies of the same notes and photos and drafts the repair list: one row per entry, with line or equipment tag, location, length or area, condition found and access needs, in the technician's own words. A second list holds entries with a missing measurement, a tag nobody can match, or a photo with no note. Nothing is priced, nothing reaches the plant, and your estimator reviews every line.

The tag is the first thing to go missing. Industrial projects that follow Process Industry Practices' INEG1000, Insulation Design and Type Codes, record why a line is insulated with codes for heat conservation, process stability, personnel protection, freeze protection, cold conservation and condensation prevention: HC, PS, PP, PF, CC and CP. That code becomes part of the line code on the piping and instrument diagrams. On a pipe rack a technician may note only a jacket color or a bay number. The draft keeps what was written, matches it against the plant's line list if you send one, and lists every entry it cannot tie to a tag.

Length is the measurement surveys lose. Insulation Outlook's 2008 account of Department of Energy steam assessments has field crews recording pipe lengths and locations, sizes, and insulation types and condition into a site spreadsheet, and says operators often couldn't state the length of their principal lines. Condensate lines often carried more bare footage than steam, and valves, sensors and elbows were often partly or wholly bare, with removable blankets never put back. DOE's Steam Tip Sheet #2 reads a survey the same way, as feet of bare line by diameter and pressure. If a note gives a rough length or a joint count, the draft shows it and says it wasn't measured.

Condition has its own words. The National Insulation Association's 2025 inspection checklist names fish mouthing at jacket seams, loose or missing securements, sagging, joints that look like they're opening, hot spots, ice on cold lines, and stained ceiling tile or wet floors below. An earlier Insulation Outlook piece points to jackets split at supports where a saddle is missing, and the Center for Chemical Process Safety lists people stepping on insulated pipe as a common cause of jacket failure. The draft keeps the technician's own term rather than assigning a grade, so your estimator sees exactly what was written.

What sits around the pipe changes the entry. DOE's Steam Tip Sheet #17 says removable pads are common on flanges, valves, expansion joints, heat exchangers, pumps, turbines and tanks, held by wire through grommets or straps with buckles, and that inverted bucket traps take snap-on covers while thermostatic and disk traps follow the maker's directions. Sheet #2 names leaking valves, external pipe leaks, tube leaks and leaks from adjacent equipment as causes of wet insulation, and says to stop the moisture before reinsulating. A wet section under a leaking flange needs more than a length. The draft carries access needs as written, such as lift, ladder, rack, permit or shutdown, and marks any entry where a leak is noted.

Two things stay out of the draft. OSHA's asbestos rules, 29 CFR 1910.1001 and 1926.1101, define thermal system insulation as asbestos-containing material on pipes, fittings, boilers, breeching, tanks and ducts, and presume it in buildings constructed no later than 1980 unless shown otherwise. Building and facility owners determine where it is, and on construction work an employer that finds it tells the owner and other employers there within 24 hours. DOE's tip sheet says to check for asbestos before removing any existing insulation. Corrosion under insulation is the plant's call too: it happens most often between 10 and 350 degrees F or in cycling service, and insulation hides it from view. The draft marks old or unknown material and corrosion notes for your estimator and decides nothing, and this page is not legal or safety advice. Your reviewer will check first the tags, the lengths marked as unmeasured, every asbestos marker, and entries with no access noted.

After your reviewer's yes, new plant surveys go through the same job for about 30 days.

Your estimator approves every list before a plant sees it, and technicians keep walking and writing as they do now.

The live job's price is fixed before you sign. Anything after it gets its own price, and monthly support starts once something is running.