4. Spare parts inventory

An industrial plant needs spare parts almost as soon as it starts up, if only to compensate for infantile breakdowns. The person in charge of maintenance must therefore have a stock of spare parts right from the start. This stock must be built up as early as the plant design phase, when the main components of the plant begin to be defined. This work includes a design phase, during which the qualitative and quantitative composition of this stock is defined, and a procurement phase, and must be carried out in such a way that this stock is, at least partially, available for plant start-up.

The simplest method, a priori, is obviously to entrust this work to the supplier, or in the case of a complex assembly to the prime contractor, but the client (or owner) will have every interest in defining precisely to the prime contractor or supplier what can be called the perimeter...