Elements of Process Safety

On July 27, 2009, OSHA issued a National Emphasis Program for the chemical industry (“the Chemical NEP”). Pursuant to the Chemical NEP, OSHA will conduct PSM inspections of numerous chemical facilities. This presentation will review lessons learned from OSHA's Refining NEP, particularly the OSHA...

Process safety is about controlling risk of failures and errors; controlling risk is primarily about reducing the risk of human error. All elements of Risk-Based Process Safety (RBPS) and alternative standards for process safety (such as US OSHA's standard for Process Safety Management [PSM] or ACC...

The OSHA Refinery National Emphasis Program (NEP) and OSHA Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) PSM Supplement ask specific questions relative to many recognized and generally accepted good engineering practices (RAGAGEP). Many of the same RAGAGEP can be expected in the planned OSHA Chemicals NEP as...

This paper describes an integrated toolset, called the Human Factors Workbench, which addresses the proactive and reactive control of human error in process operations. It is a practical application of the tools described in the CCPS publication: ‘Guidelines for Preventing Human Error in Process...

The first edition of the CCPS book Guidelines to Evaluating Vapor Cloud Explosions, Flash Fired and BLEVEs was published in 1994. Since that time there have been considerable advances in research for these types of explosions and fires, and hazard prediction methods have improved. The second...

In recent years, the nation has recognized that critical infrastructure protection should consider not only the prevention of disruptive events, but also the processes that infrastructure systems undergo to maintain functionality following disruptions. This more comprehensive approach has been...

Effective mechanical integrity programs are essential to assure safe operation of plant facilities. The current economic downturn is difficult and most manufacturing companies have experienced headcount reductions, early retirement programs and budget reductions. Companies are concerned with short...

The benefits of using bow-tie diagrams for risk management have been realized by organizations world-wide. They provide a readily understandable visualization of the relationships between the causes of business upsets, the escalation of such event to a range of possible outcomes, the controls...

In a companion paper, root cause of failure analysis (RCA) was used to estimate the times to failure of a set of spring operated pressure relief valves (SORV) that were found in the fail-to-open (FTO) condition upon proof test. We now use these estimated times to failure to estimate the failure...

Risk quantification can help in understanding and managing risk. Establishing quantitative risk criteria can be a key component to risk decision-making and many companies use quantitative risk criteria, either formally or informally. The Center for Chemical Process Safety issued its guidance on...