S5: Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA)
Sunday, April 26, 8:00am - 5:00pm
(Lunch break from 12:00pm - 1:00pm)
Where: TBD
Cost: $599
(includes the CCPS Book - Layer of Protection Analysis - Simplified Process Risk Assessment )
Instructor: William G. Bridges, Process Improvement Institute
Professional Development Hours: 7. Participating in this AIChE short course may qualify as CPC in certain jurisdictions. Attendees will receive a signed Professional Development Hours certificate at the end of the course.
Overview:
Recommended prerequisites: Attendees should have strong technical skills and prior training in qualitative hazard evaluation techniques; prior completion of Process Hazards Analysis Leadership or equivalent is highly recommended. This course is designed for experienced PHA/HAZOP leaders. Other individuals with a strong technical background (such as engineers and scientists) may attend: Managers of Operations, Safety; Project Managers; Engineers – Process, Safety, and Mechanical; PSM Coordinators and Managers
Are proposed or existing combinations of safeguards enough to prevent an accident or mitigate the consequences? Do you perceive that doing a fully quantitative risk assessment (QRA) would be over-working the problem? Then Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA) is the new tool you need to learn. LOPA combines both qualitative and quantitative elements of hazard evaluation and risk assessment to analyze and judge the adequacy of existing or proposed safeguards against process deviations and accident scenarios. A key to the success of LOPA is its rules for judging if protection layers are truly independent. Because of these rules, LOPA helps the analysts make consistent judgments of if the risk of scenarios are “as low as reasonably practical (ALARP)”. This “How To” course is taught by one of the principal authors of the AIChE/CCPS book, Layer of Protection Analysis (2001). Workshops are used as the primary mode of teaching each aspect of LOPA. You will perform several complete LOPA before leaving class.
You will Learn:
- When and how to use LOPA and How to systematically create risk scenarios
- How to establish risk acceptance (risk tolerance) criteria for use within your company (this is also called development of ALARP criteria)
- How to calculate “as-is” risk for a cause-consequence pair:
- Estimate the frequency of the initiating event and estimate consequence
- What is meant by “independence” and “uniqueness” with respect to IPLs
- How to use LOPA to determine the Safety Integrity Level (SIL) necessary for an instrument IPL (to comply with the requirements of IEC 61508/61511)
- How other companies worldwide use LOPA to:
- Decide which PHA/HAZOP recommendations to reject and which to accept
- Focus limited resources within mechanical integrity departments and operations on what is critical to manage risk to ALARP
- Avoid wasting resources on quantifying risk using QRA methods
- Perform specialized risk modeling for facility siting questions
About the Instructor:
Bill Bridges is President of PII. Formerly, he was a director of the Risk Consulting Division of ABS Consulting (formerly JBF Associates and EQE International). He is considered one of the leading authorities on process safety engineering, risk management, and human error prevention. He has a Bachelor and Masters degree in Chemical Engineering and he has over 30 years of chemical industry experience in process engineering, process/product development, management, safety evaluation, and operations. His last position in the chemical industry was as a chemical plant manager. Bill has helped many companies in the petroleum, petrochemical, plastic and chemical process industries develop, implement and assess PSM and risk management programs. Bill has taught PSM related courses, including process hazard analysis/HAZOP leadership, incident investigation/RCA, and management of change (MOC) since 1987.