Risk management of road and rail transport of hazardous materials in Sicily

A Transportation Risk Analysis (TRA) tool has been used to accurately assess the risk associated to a variety of road and rail transportation cases representative of hazardous materials transport by land in Sicily. Due to the high risk level, some risk mitigation options have been investigated: the possibility of changing route and/or transport modalities have been examined for each transportation activity, all the combinations of road, rail and intermodal (road+rail) transport have been calculated and that minimising the risk has been identified with the aid of the TRA tool.     

HazMat transport through Messina town: from risk analysis suggestions for improving territorial safety

In this paper, after briefly outlining the main features of TRAT2, its application to the land transport of dangerous goods through the downtown of Messina is outlined. Owing to its particular location, there is a large flow of hazardous materials through the city of Messina. Many of these substances come from the greatest industrialised areas of Sicily. Goods reach the town by rail or road, and cross the Straits by ship. A complete inventory of dangerous substances, detailed in the paper, was the basis of a complete risk analysis, whose results, obtained by means of the TRAT2 software, have been analysed and discussed. From both individual risk distribution and societal risk curves the importance of parameters has been obtained and this has suggested measures to improve the safety of the urban area.     

Evaluation of the Risk OMT model for maintenance work on major offshore process equipment

Operational safety is receiving more and more attention in the Norwegian offshore industry. Almost two thirds of all leaks on offshore installations in the period 2001–2005, according to the Risk Level Project by the Petroleum Safety Authority in Norway, resulted from manual operations and interventions, as well as shut-down and start-up. The intention with the Risk OMT (risk modelling – integration of organisational, human and technical factors) program has been to develop more representative models for calculation of leak frequencies as a function of the volume of manual operations and interventions. In the Risk OMT project a generic risk model has been developed and is adapted to use for specific failure scenarios. The model considers the operational barriers in event trees and fault trees, as well as risk influencing factors that determine the basic event probabilities in the fault trees. The full model, which applies Bayesian belief networks, is presented more thoroughly in a separate paper. This paper presents the evaluation of the model. The model has been evaluated through some case studies, and one important aspect is the evaluation of the importance of each risk influencing factor. In addition some risk-reducing measures have been proposed, and the paper presents how the effect of these measures has been evaluated by using the model. Finally, possible applications and recommendations for further work are discussed.     

Risk assessment in a hypothetical network pipeline in UK transporting carbon dioxide

With the advent of Carbon Capture and Storage technology (CCS) the scale and extent of its handling is set to increase. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) capture plants are expected to be situated near to power plants and other large industrial sources. Afterward CO₂ is to be transported to storage site using one or a combination of transport media: truck, train, ship or pipeline. Transport by pipeline is considered the preferred option for large quantities of CO₂ over long distances. The hazard connected with this kind of transportation can be considered an emerging risk and is the subject of this paper.The paper describes the Quantitative Risk Assessment of a hypothetical network pipeline located in UK, in particular the study of consequences due to a CO₂ release from pipeline.The risk analysis highlighted that some sections of pipeline network cross densely populated areas. For this reason, some changes in the original path of the network have been proposed in order to achieve a significant reduction in the societal risk.     

重大事故后果模拟法在天然气场站安全评价中的应用

场站是气田集输的枢纽,也是高风险存在和集中的场所。本论文采用重大事故后果模拟分析法建立天然气泄漏速率估算模型、蒸气云爆炸模型,并以陕北某一天然气场站为例,借助Risk System软件对天然气泄漏速率和泄漏量以及蒸气云爆炸最大事故进行数值模拟。模拟分析结果有助于对天然气场站可能发生的各种事故进行风险评价,也有助于对各类风险大的危险危害因素提出对应的安全对策措施,确保安全生产。     

Analysis of motorcycle accidents using association rule mining-based framework with parameter optimization and GIS technology

IntroductionAnalyzing key factors of motorcycle accidents is an effective method to reduce fatalities and improve road safety. Association Rule Mining (ARM) is an efficient data mining method to identify critical factors associated with injury severity. However, the existing studies have some limitations in applying ARM: (a) Most studies determined parameter thresholds of ARM subjectively, which lacks objectiveness and efficiency; (b) Most studies only listed rules with high parameter thresholds, while lacking in-depth analysis of multiple-item rules. Besides, the existing studies seldom conducted a spatial analysis of motorcycle accidents, which can provide intuitive suggestions for policymakers. Method: To address these limitations, this study proposes an ARM-based framework to identify critical factors related to motorcycle injury severity. A method for parameter optimization is proposed to objectively determine parameter thresholds in ARM. A method of factor extraction is proposed to identify individual key factors from 2-item rules and boosting factors from multiple-item rules. Geographic information system (GIS) is adopted to explore the spatial relationship between key factors and motorcycle injury severity. Results and conclusions: The framework is applied to a case study of motorcycle accidents in Victoria, Australia. Fifteen attributes are selected after data preprocessing. 0.03 and 0.7 are determined as the best thresholds of support and confidence in ARM. Five individual key factors and four boosting factors are identified to be related to fatal injury. Spatial analysis is conducted by GIS to present hot spots of motorcycle accidents. The proposed framework has been validated to have better performance on parameter optimization and rule analysis in ARM. Practical applications: The hot spots of motorcycle accidents related to fatal factors are presented in GIS maps. Policymakers can refer to those maps straightforwardly when decision making. This framework can be applied to various kinds of traffic accidents to improve the performance of severity analysis.     

探析GIS技术在环境影响评价中的应用

GIS技术即地理信息系统,是将地理信息制成电子地图的一门技术。GIS技术是一门新兴技术,在环境、资源等方面有很大的发展潜力,也在这些方面发挥了重大的作用。随着我国对环保工作的越来越重视,对生态污染和环境影响评价工作的关注度上升,GIS技术有了进一步在环境影响评价领域中发展的机会。本文从GIS技术本身入手,分析GIS技术的特点,探讨GIS技术在环境影响评价领域中的具体应用,希望可以为提高我国环境影响评价水平提供一些参考。     

Occupational risk of tunneling construction

This paper presents the quantification of occupational risk of the construction of a highway tunnel, located in Northern Greece. Risk assessment is based on the Workgroup Occupational Risk Model (WORM) project, developed in the Netherlands. This model can assess occupational risk at hazard level, activity level, job level and overall company risk. Seventeen job positions have been identified for this construction project, such as operators of a drilling machine, a loader, an excavator, a spraying machine, a crane operator, a blaster, a welder, the supervisor of the project, truck drivers and various other workers participating in the major construction phases. All risk profiles of workers have been quantified and jobs have been ranked according to their risk. Occupational risk has been assessed for two major tunnel construction phases which are (a) the excavation and primary support and (b) the final lining and support of the tunnel.     

On risk governance deficits

The International Risk Governance Council (IRGC) has recently presented a report comprising an analysis and illustration of the most common deficits in risk governance. The work covers issues related to both assessments and management of risk. In this paper we take a closer look into this report. We acknowledge the work as an important contribution to the risk governance field, how risk decision-makers and practitioners in government and industry can improve the risk governance, but we also point to some weaknesses in the analysis, which are critical for the understanding and use of the IRGC document. Most of these relate to the understanding of fundamental ideas and phenomena, in particular risk and uncertainty. The rationale for several defined deficits is questioned, including “missing, ignoring or exaggerating early signals of risk” and “failure of managers to respond and take action when risk assessors have determined from early signals that a risk is emerging”. Simple examples are used to illustrate the problems and show how they can be rectified.     

基于斜坡单元的浅层滑坡风险区划——以华南松岗河小流域为例

针对华南丘陵山区浅层滑坡灾害的形成机理及特征,对滑坡风险影响因素进行重点研究和筛选,提出了丘陵山区浅层滑坡灾害风险分析指标体系及其区划方法。从浅层滑坡的发生机理出发,选用斜坡单元作为山区滑坡灾害风险区划的基本单元,并利用DEM完成单元的划分。将影响滑坡灾害形成的地形起伏度、坡度、坡向、岩土结构面特征、地层岩性、风化层厚度、开垦切坡强度、居民点切坡强度、道路切坡强度九项因子作为小流域山区滑坡灾害的危险性指标,以道路密度、建设强度和开垦强度指数作为易损性指标,建立浅层滑坡灾害风险评价指标体系。最后,通过风险评价模型进行风险评价和区划。     

An integrated quantitative risk analysis method for natural gas pipeline network

Natural gas industry is developing rapidly, and its accidents are threatening the urban safety. Risk management through quantitative assessment has become an important way to improve the safety performance of the natural gas supply system. In this paper, an integrated quantitative risk analysis method for natural gas pipeline network is proposed. This method is composed of the probability assessment of accidents, the analysis of consequences and the evaluation of risk. It is noteworthy that the consequences analyzed here include those of the outside and inside gas pipelines. The analysis of consequences of the outside pipelines focuses on the individual risk and societal risk caused by different accidents, while those of the inside pipelines concerns about the risk of the economic loss because of the pressure re-distribution. Risk of a sample urban gas pipeline network is analyzed to demonstrate the presented method. The results show that this presented integrated quantitative risk analysis method for natural gas pipeline network can be used in practical application.     

Risk analysis of a warehouse for the mixing, repackaging and distribution of organic chemicals

The EEC directive on ‘Major Accident Hazards of Certain Industrial Activities’ has been implemented in Denmark. This means that risk analyses of some activities must be made before July 1989. One of the first plants that was analysed was a warehouse for the mixing, repackaging and distribution of organic chemicals. The analysis was performed as a commercial contract by Risø National Laboratory. The report has been submitted to the authorities but the plant has not yet been approved due to submission of a large amount of analyses of other plants. This paper illustrates how a risk analysis of a chemical plant can be made.     

The use of current risk analysis tools evaluated towards preventing external domino accidents

Risk analysis is an essential tool for company safety policy. Risk analysis consists of identifying and evaluating all possible risks. The efficiency of risk analysis tools depends on the rigueur of identifying and evaluating all possible risks. The diversity in risk analysis procedures is such that there are many appropriate techniques for any circumstance and the choice has become more a matter of taste. In this paper, we examine the risk analysis tools used by 24 chemical plants in Belgium, mainly located in the port of Antwerp, the second largest chemical cluster in the world after Houston, TX, USA. The aim of this paper is to identify the current practice in the chemical industry subject to European Seveso legislation and to examine how the present methods can be integrated to improve safety policy, especially towards preventing major accidents. Moreover, conclusions on the prevention of catastrophic external domino accidents involving several companies are formulated. This paper also gives impulse to investigating cross-company management implementations concerning external domino accident prevention.     

Risk analysis for road and rail transport of hazardous materials: a GIS approach

An approach to transportation risk analysis for road and rail transport of dangerous goods is proposed, which is based on the use of geographic information systems (GIS) to manage territorial information, coupled with a product data bank in a risk evaluation tool. Such an approach enables to accurately take into account the local data affecting risk analysis, such as population, accident rate, and weather conditions along all the route, by means of a system which can be easily updated. The resulting risk evaluation tool assists in the step of route identification and allows to rapidly perform an accurate transportation risk analysis, for a single transportation event as well as for multiple substances, trips and itineraries.     

基于点危险源的危险品运输路径优化研究

为合理选择危险品运输路径,降低危险品运输事故造成的损失,使道路危险品运输风险评价更符合实际情况,建立点危险源风险评价模型。模型综合考虑了运输时间和季节情况影响因子,在准确估算危险品泄漏事故毒害区域面积和后果损失的基础上,结合传统风险评价模型与最大最小模型进行求解。最后通过算例分析,检验该模型的实际运用,通过与传统求和方式所得的最优运输路径的对比,反映2种方式所求得的最优运输路径并不相同,同时也表明,用所建模型求得的运输路径风险值有更高的精确性。计算结果表明:该模型求得的某条运输路径的风险值等于该路径上风险值最大的路段的风险值,而不是该路径上所有路段的风险值之和。     

3-Parameters SPW technique: A new method for evaluation of target safety integrity level

Introduced by IEC-61508 standard, safety integrity levels (SIL) have been used for assessing the reliability of safety instrumented functions (SIF) for protection of the system under control in abnormal conditions. Different qualitative, semi-qualitative and quantitative methods have been proposed by the standard for establishing target safety integrity levels amongst which “Risk Graph” has gained wide attention due to its simplicity and easy-to-apply characteristics. However, this method is subject to many deficiencies that have forced industry men and experts to modify it to fit their demands. In this paper, a new modification to risk graph parameters has been proposed that adds more flexibility to them and reduces their subjective uncertainties but keeps the method as simple as before. Three parameters, namely severity (S), hazard avoidance probability (P), and demand rate (W) are used instead of former four parameters. Hence, the method is named SPW. The outcome results of this method can be directly converted to probability of failure on demand (PFD) or risk reduction factor (RRF). The proposed method has been tested on an example case that has been studied before with conventional risk graph and LOPA techniques. The results show that new method agrees well with LOPA and reduces costs imposed by conservative approximations assumed during application of conventional risk graph.     

Major accidents in process industries and an analysis of causes and consequences

This paper briefly recapitulates some of the major accidents in chemical process industries which occurred during 1926–1997. These case studies have been analysed with a view to understand the damage potential of various types of accidents, and the common causes or errors which have led to disasters. An analysis of different types of accidental events such as fire, explosion and toxic release has also been done to assess the damage potential of such events. It is revealed that vapour cloud explosion (VCE) poses the greatest risk of damage. The study highlights the need for risk assessment in chemical process industries.     

基于GIS的非点源污染的研究及应用

非点源污染已经成为全球重要的环境问题，数学模型是非点源污染研究的核心内容之一。本阐述了GIS与非点源污染模型结合的意义及其必然性，分析了两结合的基本组成及集成方式，并对两不同集成方式进行了描述。分析了目前国内外的研究状况，最后结合项目给出了GIS和非点源污染模型相结合的应用示例。     

Occupational health and safety in the framework of corporate social responsibility

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been defined as the voluntary integration of social and environmental concerns into the firm’s decision-making. The search for a good Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) environment and the promotion of a culture of risk prevention are two of the firm’s main social responsibilities, and consequently an integral part of CSR. This paper discusses how the growing interest in corporate social responsibility can contribute to improving the implementation of adequate systems of prevention. For this purpose, we study to what extent OHS issues are present in the field of CSR, and consequently determine which aspects have received the most attention, and which are less well developed; we offer some proposals as well. The methodology followed is a content analysis of the main international CSR management tools.     

Quantitative assessment of environmental risk due to accidental spills from onshore pipelines

The transport of hazardous materials by pipeline is widely used for the transfer of significant quantities of oil and chemicals. Due to the extremely low frequency of spills, pipelines are considered the safest mode for the land transportation of hazardous substances. Accident records, while confirming that Loss of Containment (LOC) events are rare, also point out the major-accident hazard of pipelines, due to the extremely severe potential consequences of spills. Quantitative Risk Analysis (QRA) techniques have been applied to pipelines since many years with the aim of evaluating risk for workers or exposed population. However, releases of liquids, as oil and oil products, also create an hazard to the environment, due to the potential of extensive soil and groundwater contamination. An integrated model was developed for the environmental Risk Analysis of spills from pipelines. Specific environmental risk indexes were defined, expressing the risk of soil and groundwater contamination, both in physical and economic terms. A case-study is presented and discussed to illustrate the features of the methodology. The results confirmed that the proposed model may be considered an important tool within a comprehensive approach to the management of risk related to onshore pipelines.