Government likes to rate chemical plants based on 19 key performance indicators in order to create need for zero accidents in their plants with respect to safety and security and also to provide incentives to good organizations.
I feel this is a beginning and new idea from government. Government should further extend this and ask insurance companies to use this rating while assessing the premiums. Erring companies should be charged high premiums.
But, care is to be taken to ensure that (risk) assessment will be carried out by experts and these experts are selected based on strict parameters. Else, poor assessment leads to wrong faith in the capabilities of chemical plants and its management.
Government proposes safety rating system for chemical plants | Business Standard
The draft document is available from the link as below. Interested parties can send suggestions by end of October 2013. Such suggestions can be sent by e-mail at dirrt1@rediffmail.com; arun.agarwal@nic.in or by post. The department after receiving the comments will incorporate to prepare final documents on “Chemical Plant Safety and Security Rating System”.
http://chemicals.nic.in/Forwd30092013.pdf
Showing posts with label risk assessment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label risk assessment. Show all posts
Feb 9, 2013
Human error-power supply failure to air traffic controller radar screen at IGI, New Delhi
In an incident involving human error, an electrician at Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport, New Delhi switched off a miniature circuit breaker (MCB) while fixing an electrical fitting. This MCB as it is reported, is on the line supplying power to air traffic controller (ATC) radar screens and screens went blank. The standby power (may be diesel generator) came into line in a few seconds and rebooting of all consoles and restoration took about 45 minutes.
Meanwhile, the air traffic controllers having tough time, guided the planes for safe landing with their experience. All departures were put on hold in between. As it is during such emergency times, Murphy's law showed its application once again. But the experienced personnel guided even a plane or two, low on fuel to land safely without panic.
From various reports in the internet about the incident, there seems to be failure of, or no uninterrupted power supply (UPS) / inverter backup directly connected to ATC radar system, as the screens went blank. That it took sometime for standby power to come into line, indicates that this is a diesel generator (DG) set power supply. This takes about 30 seconds as we experience in apartment complexes or cinema halls. Generally, people use UPS even for domestic computers, because of fear of losing data. Also, because of power cuts, people use inverter widely at home and business houses. For critical systems, normal power supply should be through inverter/UPS so that any failure of power supply on upstream side will not affect the operations. Now-a-days, solar powered inverters are also available in the market. This should be in addition to the other backups for use. MCB/any other switch should be located on upstream side of these UPS/inverter, rather than on the downstream end so that mistakes like these will not happen. May be the authorities were confident of their backup systems.
Generally, risk assessment is same for aviation and nuclear industries. The risk assessment should be reviewed and measures should be taken to reduce risk levels. It is horrible to think of so many planes in the air without guidance for landing.
To avoid such mistakes as in this case, there is a need for safety work permit system as practiced in all industrial facilities, for carrying out any job having impact on human lives, property and or environment. Also, that this important MCB could be switched off by mistake indicates that critical safety systems are not protected or its importance is not recognized. Authorities have to review entire safety practices, identify critical systems having impact on persons/property/environment and prepare documented procedure for implementation. Suitable caution boards/warning signs/names and contact numbers of authorities to be contacted in case of need should be displayed near these critical items. A nodal authority (safety officer) should be identified for entire ATC under whom, permission/approval should be given for various works so that there will not be any lapse. If more than an authority is identified, there may be a situation that one will not know about permission/approval given by the other. Also, lockout/tagout (LOTO) system, if feasible needs to be put in place.
Apart from power failure like above, it is possible that due to hardware or software glitch or even entry of insects/lizards, the screens can go blank or computer system can hang and for such a situation also, one has to plan for diverse redundant systems to avoid surprise/panic. Whenever, there is no communication between computers or computer and signal receiving/emitting towers or no change in data for a specified time (may be a second or milli second or some other duration depending upon the criticality), audio-visual alarms should be incorporated to alert the concerned personnel for immediate action.
Dec 21, 2010
Top 50 Risk Management Blogs
Listed below is the link on top 50 risk management blogs of which I follow the 7th blog i.e Risk and Safety Blog that gives some ideas of risk assessment and an understanding of the risk.
http://www.mastersinriskmanagement.org/top-50-risk-management-blogs.html#7
http://www.mastersinriskmanagement.org/top-50-risk-management-blogs.html#7
Aug 22, 2010
Stress and accidents
Reason for many of the accidents appears very simple and silly at times. Many of the accidents did not occur because of some complex reactions or failure of safety systems. But, why do people get involved in such silly accidents. I think, lack of peace of mind is the reason. When we are not at peace, we cannot concentrate on our activity. Lack of peace can be due to
Accident means an event that unplanned, unexpected, unintentional,...
Though, nobody intends to get in to accident, lack of hazard identification, failure to take preventive measures and not reviewing the safety processes are the reasons for accidents. However simple the hazard appears, we should not be casual. It should be attended immediately. There is no use of repenting after the accident.
Similarly, one should not be relaxed when there are no accidents. May be they are not reported. May be there are many unreported nearmisses. May be the attitude of the manager is not to see minor accidents as accidents.
It is common for top management to boast of good safety record and take credit for it. But, a trulyaccident-free workplace is a reality because of sustained efforts all employees over a period of time. It will not happen overnight or in a week or in a month or in a year.
Some people attach value to human life and workout how much money can be spent on safety programme. My life may be worth $ 1.0 million to you. But, my family does not see like that. For them, it is invaluable. Nobody can remove the tears in the eyes of family members, when somebody dies. Nobody got right to decide the value of human life.
I read in the internet that some organizations care for their employees by attending to their personal problems, employ professionals to teach yoga, meditation and allocate time within working hours so that their employees can have healthy and peaceful life.
What for we earn money, if we do not have stress-free life. Though, some people say, certain stress is required for the growth of the individual, I think this is purely business oriented. The increase in suicide rate everywhere in the world shows that so called acceptable stress is NOT acceptable to the individual. As there is no other means to earn income, persons accept the additional demands and stress themselves. Ultimately, weak hearted will take their lives. Persons responsible for causing stress should think twice by entering into others shoes and then decide about the work.
- arguments with relations / servants / milkman / paper boy/ gas station employ
- children education
- well being of blood relations
- arguments with colleagues
- business loss
- greed
- simple problems like vehicle breakdown, plumbing problem at home, ...
- financial needs
- thinking about meeting, examination, bank loan, ...
- etc
Accident means an event that unplanned, unexpected, unintentional,...
Though, nobody intends to get in to accident, lack of hazard identification, failure to take preventive measures and not reviewing the safety processes are the reasons for accidents. However simple the hazard appears, we should not be casual. It should be attended immediately. There is no use of repenting after the accident.
Similarly, one should not be relaxed when there are no accidents. May be they are not reported. May be there are many unreported nearmisses. May be the attitude of the manager is not to see minor accidents as accidents.
It is common for top management to boast of good safety record and take credit for it. But, a trulyaccident-free workplace is a reality because of sustained efforts all employees over a period of time. It will not happen overnight or in a week or in a month or in a year.
Some people attach value to human life and workout how much money can be spent on safety programme. My life may be worth $ 1.0 million to you. But, my family does not see like that. For them, it is invaluable. Nobody can remove the tears in the eyes of family members, when somebody dies. Nobody got right to decide the value of human life.
I read in the internet that some organizations care for their employees by attending to their personal problems, employ professionals to teach yoga, meditation and allocate time within working hours so that their employees can have healthy and peaceful life.
What for we earn money, if we do not have stress-free life. Though, some people say, certain stress is required for the growth of the individual, I think this is purely business oriented. The increase in suicide rate everywhere in the world shows that so called acceptable stress is NOT acceptable to the individual. As there is no other means to earn income, persons accept the additional demands and stress themselves. Ultimately, weak hearted will take their lives. Persons responsible for causing stress should think twice by entering into others shoes and then decide about the work.
Jun 5, 2010
Value of human life for risk assessment
I received a mail (risk-safety.com blog) about Treatment of Value of Life and Injuries in Preparing Economic Evaluations is mentioned in an article of DOT in link given below:
http://ostpxweb.dot.gov/policy/reports/080205.htm
According to it, best present estimate of the economic value of preventing a human fatality is $5.8 million. One can go through the above link for factual information and basis for arriving at this value.
I have put it in this blog as I am sure, this will help organizations in risk assessment and reduction measures. I thank the people who arrived at this value and those who spread the information for saving valuable human lives.
http://ostpxweb.dot.gov/policy/reports/080205.htm
According to it, best present estimate of the economic value of preventing a human fatality is $5.8 million. One can go through the above link for factual information and basis for arriving at this value.
I have put it in this blog as I am sure, this will help organizations in risk assessment and reduction measures. I thank the people who arrived at this value and those who spread the information for saving valuable human lives.
Feb 14, 2009
Risk = Probability (???) x SEVERITY
Yesterday I read a news item that a US satellite Iridium-33 in use collided with a Russian satellite Cosmos 2251 that is no longer in use on Tuesday (10.02.2009) at 0455 GMT at 790 km height above Siberia. It seems that this type of accident happened for the first time. There are more than 17000 man-made objects at present in the space. I went through internet and found that the probability of such collision is once in tens of years and the debris now generated can reduce this probability to once in a year or so as there are some more satellites in the same altitude and the total debris may hinder space craft movement in the future.
Now, the question is not about space but on the events on the earth.
In any factory, accidents keep occurring. When somebody (normally safety officer / advisor) points out about unsafe acts / unsafe conditions in the shop floor / factory premises and asks for correction, the usual reaction is, a staring look and then the reply comes, "oh, we have been doing this for the last few years / we are doing like this from the beginning / who is expert -you are me - you safety people does not know any thing other than talking / I can't do - you come and do / so on...
How true are the words of the famous safety professional Trevor Kletz -
Corporates do not have memory.
We have done this way 100 times is not acceptable unless an accident on 101st time is acceptable.
We never imagined that satellite collision is possible. But, it happened. Where the chances are remote, still it happened and where the chances are high in our activities in the shop floor, we do not want to correct our selves.
If we see the accident history in any factory, after the accident, the usual sheepish answer from the injured or his colleagues or manager is that it happened for the first time, the person is experience, skilled, safety conscious, near retirement, he doesn't want to take official leave and will take personal leave for the period away from duty due to accident, so on.
In spite of all the above qualities, still accidents occurred, then imagine what can happen to others. It is the attitude that requires correction rather than any thing else.
When somebody narrates their own experience, people listen attentively, appreciate him that he came clean and after coming out from the room the listeners do the same old things. This is why accidents keep occurring again and again, if not to the same person / or same shop floor, they will be occurring somewhere else to some body else.
We love short cuts and feel that we are above all others, accident does not occur when we are working.
One of my colleague, who retired 4 years ago, used to tell in all his training classes, that we should leave the organization with same organs as we had when we joined.
Yes, it is true that no body wants to lose their organs and suffer. But, momentary decision without thought for consequences will lead to accidents.
Rarely, does the type of accident will be new in any factory that is few years old. May be after the accident, corrective actions are taken. But after few years, the corrected systems will be replaced because people forget the reasons for safe guards in place and meddle with the systems. They want to prove to their bosses that they are inventors and soon after their will be accidents and shop floor persons will be suffered. But, the so called inventor would have got his promotion or pay rise and even would have left the organization.
So, every body should work seriously on the hazards at the shop floor, let the probability is however less. Nobody says there is no (zero) probability of occuring for an accident. In fact the word probability it self gives meaning of some uncertainty. Hence, if the severity / consequence from even from remote probable event is not acceptable, without looking for chance of occurrence, we should eliminate all those hazards and make our work place safer.
Risk assessment and actions should concentrate more on consequence rather than on probability and make life safer for persons.
Now, the question is not about space but on the events on the earth.
In any factory, accidents keep occurring. When somebody (normally safety officer / advisor) points out about unsafe acts / unsafe conditions in the shop floor / factory premises and asks for correction, the usual reaction is, a staring look and then the reply comes, "oh, we have been doing this for the last few years / we are doing like this from the beginning / who is expert -you are me - you safety people does not know any thing other than talking / I can't do - you come and do / so on...
How true are the words of the famous safety professional Trevor Kletz -
Corporates do not have memory.
We have done this way 100 times is not acceptable unless an accident on 101st time is acceptable.
We never imagined that satellite collision is possible. But, it happened. Where the chances are remote, still it happened and where the chances are high in our activities in the shop floor, we do not want to correct our selves.
If we see the accident history in any factory, after the accident, the usual sheepish answer from the injured or his colleagues or manager is that it happened for the first time, the person is experience, skilled, safety conscious, near retirement, he doesn't want to take official leave and will take personal leave for the period away from duty due to accident, so on.
In spite of all the above qualities, still accidents occurred, then imagine what can happen to others. It is the attitude that requires correction rather than any thing else.
When somebody narrates their own experience, people listen attentively, appreciate him that he came clean and after coming out from the room the listeners do the same old things. This is why accidents keep occurring again and again, if not to the same person / or same shop floor, they will be occurring somewhere else to some body else.
We love short cuts and feel that we are above all others, accident does not occur when we are working.
One of my colleague, who retired 4 years ago, used to tell in all his training classes, that we should leave the organization with same organs as we had when we joined.
Yes, it is true that no body wants to lose their organs and suffer. But, momentary decision without thought for consequences will lead to accidents.
Rarely, does the type of accident will be new in any factory that is few years old. May be after the accident, corrective actions are taken. But after few years, the corrected systems will be replaced because people forget the reasons for safe guards in place and meddle with the systems. They want to prove to their bosses that they are inventors and soon after their will be accidents and shop floor persons will be suffered. But, the so called inventor would have got his promotion or pay rise and even would have left the organization.
So, every body should work seriously on the hazards at the shop floor, let the probability is however less. Nobody says there is no (zero) probability of occuring for an accident. In fact the word probability it self gives meaning of some uncertainty. Hence, if the severity / consequence from even from remote probable event is not acceptable, without looking for chance of occurrence, we should eliminate all those hazards and make our work place safer.
Risk assessment and actions should concentrate more on consequence rather than on probability and make life safer for persons.
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