Operational Risk, Process Safety

Reactive chemicals refer to chemicals that can react with self or with other chemicals or contaminants leading to extremely high reaction rates. The high reaction rates in turn can lead to overpressure within the vessel and possible explosion. As a graduate student, I looked at behavior of reactive chemical hydroxylamine which was involved in an explosion at Concept Sciences facility in Allentown, PA.

Take a look at the following video on how hydroxylamine reacts upon addition of metal solution.

How would you answer the following question:

Is refinery A safer than refinery B?

Hurricanes pose serious risks to physical assets in chemical plants and refineries. During hurricanes, plant equipment can be damaged by high winds and/or flood waters. I’m hoping your refinery has adequate protection against flooding…so let us see what risks are posed by high winds.

There is a big difference between proactively mitigating risks vs. reacting to incidents. Why do corporations wait to take active safety measures till an incident occurs? Because being proactive is hard…very hard and requires a lot of discipline.

RAGAGEP stands for Recognized And Generally Accepted Good Engineering Practices.

Specifically, OSHA 29 CFR 1910.119 (D)(3)(ii) states:The employer shall document that equipment complies with recognized and generally accepted good engineering practices.

EPA RMP also refers to RAGAGEP in 40 CFR 68.73:Inspection and testing procedures shall follow recognized and generally accepted good engineering practices. [Read more…]

On the morning of July 19, a fire in CITGO’s Corpus Christi refinery injured a worker. The incident occurred in the alkylation unit of the refinery.

The refinery used Hydrogen Fluoride (HF) as a catalyst for alklyation .  Typically in the alkylation process, isobutane  and olefins are combined (in presence of HF) to produce a high-octane chemical used in premium gasoline.

Following the release of natural gas, it can be ignited resulting in fire which in turn can potentially result in an explosion. So how likely will a gas release ignite?If you are interested in the major failure modes for natural gas transmission pipelines reported, please refer to an earlier post – External Damage: Number One Cause Natural Gas Pipeline Releases.The ignition probability is related to leak size. Let us consider three hole sizes consistent with European Gas Pipeline Incident Data Group (EGIG) database – small (pin-hole leak, 2-cm or less), medium (2-cm < Leak < pipe diameter) and large (full bore rupture, FBR). The table below summarizes ignition probabilities from EGIG report.

In our daily lives we often become immune to risks around us. For example, there are around 40,000 annual fatalities from automobile accidents in the US and yet we do not think twice before getting into their cars. We eat a burger ignoring the risks of heart problems!

A few weeks ago I met with Cesar de Leon who is a pipeline safety expert (http://www.pipelinesafetyconsultant.com) – he worked at the DOT Office of Pipeline Safety for over 23 years and currently resides in Boerne, Texas. Cesar was telling me about legal and technical issues arising in the field of natural gas pipelines from existing regulations… I will discuss these issues in greater details in latter posts. Before getting into current issues, I would like you to read the following guest post from Cesar that provides a brief overview of pipeline integrity management plan.

In the last two years, I have traveled significantly…have an elite status on three airlines and lots of frequent flyer miles. There are quite a few aspects of a trip that are routine and boring. One such thing is the safety announcement or video at the beginning of each flight. Why do they have it?

Chemical Facility Anti Terrorism Standard (CFATS) came into force on Nov. 20, 2007 as a Federal Regulation under 6 CFR 27. This set into motion the process of assessing threats to chemical plants and refineries in the U.S.

According to a recent report (Aug. 2008) from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Chemical Safety Board (CSB) is not in compliance with its statutory mandates.  The CSB is an independent federal agency charged with investigating industrial chemical accidents and has been in operation since 1998. GAO report states that CSB is not investigating all chemical releases that have a fatality, serious injury, substantial property damage, or the potential for a fatality, serious injury, or substantial property damage. [Read more…]

Eating a few fries this one time will not increase risks of a heart attack. Plus I like the fries from this joint. I’m ready to order!!

That was a relatively easy decision; however, there are certain decisions that are more complex and may have significant implications to your organization’s future including organizational safety.

Communicating risks to public from chemical or nuclear facilities is a major challenge. We notice this over and over again with EPA community-right-to-know, nuclear power plants and lately with the LNG facilities.

We appear to be in a global recession – companies all over are struggling to deal with impact of economic slowdown. In an attempt to maintain profits, companies are drastically reducing their spending and also trimming down their workforce. It is anticipated that one-fourth of the employers in the US will undergo workforce reduction in 2009. As a result of pessimism and uncertainty about future, there is an increased level of anxiety amongst the employees. There are a few issues that a chemical manufacturing firm must address to ensure safe operation during the downturn: