Archive for the ‘Process Safety’ Category
Monday, February 8th, 2010
Workplace Safety training is a big industry...every year companies are spending millions of dollars on training their employees.
I have always doubted the efficacy of repetitive and boring training sessions whether personal or virtual (Will your Refresher Training Work?). What is more surprising is that organizations are increasing their training budget ...
Posted in Process Safety, Training | 9 Comments »
Tuesday, January 26th, 2010
Based on incident data in biodiesel facilities, I had written that the biodiesel industry in the US is experiencing an incident every two-and-a-half months, i.e. approx. 10 weeks.
Here are incidents following my May 2009 blog post on biodiesel incident frequency.
1. 15 July 2009, Chicago: An explosion at a biodiesel plant ...
Posted in Biofuels, Incident Investigation, Process Safety | No Comments »
Thursday, January 7th, 2010
Surprisingly, many organization and professionals believe that safety can be achieved by common sense. Here is an excellent article from Kevin Jones' Safety at Work blog about common sense and safety:
Safety is More Than Common Sense
Posted in Process Safety, Risk Analysis | 5 Comments »
Monday, January 4th, 2010
Recently, Erik, a reader of this blog directed me to a video his firm has created that explains the role of trees leading to the Buncefield explosion.
Remember the Buncefield incident occurred in oil storage and transport depot. Thus the fuel involved was liquid hydrocarbon. The most probable outcome of a ...
Posted in Fires and explosions, Incident Investigation, Process Safety | No Comments »
Thursday, December 31st, 2009
I would like to wish readers and the growing list of subscribers of risk and safety blog a prosperous 2010.
It has been a year since I started writing the blog. Here are top five blog posts for 2009:
1. Biofuel Safety: Is it time for Bio-PSM?
2. Lithium Battery Fires: Why Your ...
Posted in Battery Fires, Biofuels, Fires and explosions, Process Safety, Risk Analysis | 4 Comments »
Monday, October 19th, 2009
According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), there were 11 deaths every 100,000 workers in India in 2005. This number was two in the US and 0.01 in Japan. What is scary is that the number of fatalities may be significantly underestimated because of absence of a formal accident tracking ...
Posted in Chemical Accidents, Process Safety, Regulations | No Comments »
Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
CSB’s approach to chemical accident investigation is a step further than OSHA’s. CSB gathers background information about the accidents, performs a detailed root cause study, and makes recommendations to appropriate stakeholders. Great approach to a complex issue...but CSB’s strategy following the investigation leaves a lot to be desired.
The hope from ...
Posted in Chemical Accidents, Process Safety, Regulations | 2 Comments »
Monday, September 28th, 2009
A process is described as inherently safer if it reduces or eliminates one or more process hazards and this reduction or elimination is accomplished through changes that are permanent and inseparable.Below are strategies for achieving inherent safety:
Minimize : Use small quantities of hazardous substances
Substitute: Replace a material with a less ...
Posted in Inherent Safety, Process Safety | No Comments »
Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009
We have been burning wood since days of the caveman. But did you know that wood can also explode?
Logs of wood will not explode but fine dust can lead to a fire and explosion. Let us see why.
As the size of combustible particle reduces there are two major factors that ...
Posted in Dust Explosions, Fires and explosions, Process Safety | 1 Comment »
Monday, September 21st, 2009
Methane being extremely flammable, the fire and gas detection (FGD) system in LNG facilities should be capable of early detection of flammable gas leading to shutdown/isolation and depressurization.
Usually catalytic combustion type gas sensors are used for detecting LNG vapors; however, for these combustion gas sensors to work the vapors within ...
Posted in Fires and explosions, LNG, Process Safety | 7 Comments »
