ACT method for safety training: An approach to improve on-site safety performance

Unsafe behavior is one of the main causes limiting the improvement of on-site safety performance. Safety training is an important means of preventing unsafe behavior. With changes in the scale of operations and employee characteristics, traditional training methods have largely failed to meet the practical demands. Therefore, to improve the effectiveness of safety training, this paper analyzes the shortcomings of the current training methods, demonstrates the potential value of accident cases for improving the training effect, and the advantages of 24Model for case analysis in safety training. Subsequently, this paper constructs a systematic training system with Accident-Cause-Training (ACT) as the training relationship chain, which runs the accident cases throughout the training process, 24Model is utilized to trace the unsafe behaviors that lead to accidents from the perspectives of organizational and individual level, and the training content is established according to the analysis results. This paper also conducts a case study to verify the operability of the ACT method, specifically, a training programme for limited space operations at a national-level oil and gas storage and transportation company is designed and implemented. Finally, by comparing the similarities and differences between the ACT method and other training methods from various perspectives, the universality and participation of the ACT method are proved, and the development trend of the ACT method is also discussed. It is believed that the proposed ACT method could enrich the types of safety training methods and provide an effective and scientific tool to enhance the safety performance of field operations.     

谈谈中药制药企业抓好安全管理的经验和体会

中药制药企业安全工作虽进步很大,但仍存在一些问题.介绍了几点抓好安全生产管理的经验与体会.     

Ensuring emergency planning & response meet the minimum Process Safety Management (PSM) standards requirements

When incidents happen and the consequences are not mitigated effectively, one of the indicated failures consists of ineffective emergency planning and response (EPR). EPR is an important aspect of the Process Safety Management (PSM) Standards, and the guidelines are stated in CFR 1910.119 (n) which explains the minimum elements of emergency response and procedures in handling emergency or small releases. Despite its implementation in 1992, CSB finds ineffective EPR system in certain accidents such as the Missouri DPS Enterprise Chlorine Gas Release accident in 2002. DPS EPR failed in planning on location of emergency equipment and accessibility. Many other accidents have occurred throughout the decade and even though organizations have their own EPR system, there are issues in meeting minimum PSM requirements. There also exists the problem of self-regulatory policies practiced by organizations, which might not meet these requirements as well. To help organizations meet these minimum requirements, the purpose of this paper is to present a structured and easy technique to plan and implement EPR as per PSM requirements. A model has been developed based on this technique, and its application has been tested as a case study in a refinery in Malaysia and discussed throughout this report. The results reflected the feasibility of this model as it helped users to track and manage documents efficiently. This technique has the potential to help users to manage EPR better and to reduce adverse impacts to people, environment and assets.     

From the traditional concept of safety management to safety integrated with quality

This editorial reviews the evolution of the concepts of safety and quality that have been used in the traditional workplace. The traditional programs of safety are explored showing strengths and weaknesses. The concept of quality management is also viewed. Safety management and quality management principles, stages, and measurement are highlighted. The concepts of quality and safety guarantee are assessed. Total Quality Management concepts are reviewed and applied to safety quality. Total safety management principles are discussed. Finally, an analysis of the relationship between quality and safety from data collected from a company in Spain is presented.     

基于GIS的小城镇洪灾淹没分析与应急决策系统

近年来,将GIS技术与水文模型相结合,再根据数字高程模型DEM预测、模拟显示洪水淹没区,并进行灾害评估,已成为GIS应用和水利领域一个研究热点。笔者介绍了利用GIS技术建立的小城镇洪灾淹没分析与应急决策系统的构架、数据库的建设及其实现的功能等内容。该系统解决了一系列关键技术:小城镇空间数据库的建库技术及三维可视化、洪水淹没范围的确定以及洪水淹没实时动态演示等,能够对洪水灾害及其损失进行分析预测,对洪水灾情进行快速评估,是小城镇政府部门科学地制定防洪和减灾对策,迅速有效地采取抗洪救灾措施的保障手段。该系统适合我国现有国情,有利于维护小城镇社会经济持续稳定发展,具有很强的现实意义。     

Use of safety barriers in operational safety decision making

Operational personnel in complex hazardous industries are regularly called upon to make decisions that balance the production and safety objectives of their organisation. Regulations and industry standards focus on defining and complying with operating limits of various kinds as the primary method of achieving the right balance. Such limits remove the need in many cases for in-the-moment judgements about safety and production priorities.Focussing solely on the compliance with a pre-defined envelope underestimates the direct contribution to safety from operational managers based on their professional judgement. Research in a chemical plant, a nuclear power station and an air navigation service provider has identified a “line in the sand” approach taken by experienced operating personnel when abnormal situations arise. In developing these situation-specific self-imposed limits, operational managers focus on the status of safety barriers, rather than considering risk from first principles. This approach could form the basis of a new procedure, which lays out the process to be followed in determining how best to proceed (similar to job safety analysis or permit to work). This would acknowledge that such decisions are necessary, assist operational personnel in making better choices and open such decisions to appropriate audit and scrutiny.     

Diagnosis of safety culture in safety management audits

Based on the sociotechnical systems approach, an understanding of safety culture as deeply rooted assumptions about the interplay of people, technology, and organization in their relation to safety is presented. As a complement to audit methods aimed at assessing formal safety management, a questionnaire was developed which allows some indications of these assumptions to be captured by providing data on perceptions regarding operational safety, safety and design strategies, and personal job needs. Analyzing response patterns of different occupational, hierarchical, and organizational groups within a company in combination with formal audit results and the communicative validation of both in a feedback meeting can help the auditors as well as the members of the company to gain a deeper understanding of safety management and safety culture in that company. Results from seven audits in petrochemical plants are presented and discussed with respect to the validity and practicability of the chosen approach.     

重大事故应急计划要素及其制定程序

论述了重大事故应急计划组成及其十大要素 ;介绍了制定企业事故应急计划的程序方法 ;针对我国现状 ,提出了建立我国重大事故应急救援体系的建议     

Determination of emergency assembly point for industrial accidents with AHP analysis

Major industrial accidents, which are a type of technological disaster, are very important due to the security risks and financial damages that threaten the environment and human health in today's industrialization. In this study, it was aimed to propose an approach that will guide the decision makers to choose the emergency assembly point that should be in the distance or shelter where the employees will be not affected by the negative consequences of emergencies within the scope of the obligation of industrial establishments preparing an internal emergency plan for major industrial accidents. For this purpose, in the first stage, modelling studies were carried out with ALOHA (Areal Locations of Hazardous Atmospheres) Software over possible accident scenarios in an industrial establishment containing different types and amounts of hazardous chemicals. As a result of modelling studies, possible toxic emissions, fire and explosion effect distances and threat zones for the industrial establishment were obtained. In the second stage, the weights of the main and sub-selection criteria to be used in determining the assembly point were calculated. This stage was carried out based on the comparison data obtained as a result of the questionnaire applied to professionals with the help of AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) method, which is one of the multi-criteria decision making methods. In the last stage, three candidate points were selected considering the physical effect areas determined in the first stage in the boundaries of the establishment, where the employees were evaluated to be affected the minimum from the negative consequences of industrial accidents. These candidate points were evaluated again with the AHP method on the basis of the sub-criteria whose relative weights were determined in the second stage and a selection was made. As a result, an approach that provides the solution of our problem was obtained.     

Creating safer workplaces: assessing the determinants and role of safety climate

PROBLEM: Although there has been considerable interest in safety climate, relatively little attention has been given to the factors that determine safety climate or to testing the hypothesized mediating role of safety climate with respect to safety-related outcomes. METHOD: Questionnaire responses were obtained from 2,208 employees of a large national retail chain in 21 different locations. RESULTS: After controlling for demographic variables, three factors: environmental conditions, safety-related policies and programs, and general organizational climate, accounted for 55% of the variance in perceived safety climate. Interestingly, organizational climate made a significant contribution to safety climate, even after controlling for the other more safety-relevant variables. Partial correlations showed that safety policies and programs had the largest observed correlation with safety climate, followed by two of the dimensions of organizational climate (communication and organizational support). Using Baron and Kenny's (J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 51 (1986) 1173) procedures, the principal effects of the various work situation factors on perceived safety at work were found to be direct rather than mediated by safety climate. Safety climate influenced perceived safety at work, but its role as a mediator was limited. IMPACT ON INDUSTRY: These results are discussed in terms of other recent findings on safety climate and the growing interest in understanding management and organizational factors in the context of workplace safety.     

Empirical investigation of construction safety management activities and performance in Australia

The construction industry seems to suffer from a general inability to manage workplace health and safety to a level where an achieved improvement in safety performance by a way of pro-active measures can result in zero accidents. This paper investigates the effectiveness of safety management activities as currently adopted by Australian contracting organisations. A safety management survey has been conducted of contracting organisations operating in the State of Queensland, Australia. Based on a research model depicting statistical analysis techniques, a safety management index reflecting the intensity of level of safety management activities has been developed to provide a means whereby individual organisations can be assessed and graded on their safety management commitment and attitudes. The paper reports on a detailed empirical analysis carried out to examine the relationship between the intensity of safety management commitment and the overall safety performance, pro-activeness and record.     

Safety leadership and safety performance in petrochemical industries: The mediating role of safety climate

This study examines the relationship among three latent variables: safety leadership, safety climate, and safety performance. Employees from 23 plants in seven departments of a petrochemical company in central Taiwan completed a questionnaire survey. From this, a sample of 521 responses was randomly selected. Structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis using the AMOS 5.0 was employed to test the hypothesized model relating the above-mentioned variables. The results indicate that the model was supported, and that safety climate mediated the relationship between safety leadership and performance. Practical implications of these results for process safety management in the petrochemical industries are discussed.     

Exploring the information literacy of professionals in safety management

With the rapid development of increasingly complex technology and large scale industrial projects, all kinds of safety problems become extremely intricate in daily safety management (SM). It is therefore indispensable to effectively collect, analyze, assess, and synthesize information that is relevant to accident risk. In this paper, the concept of the information literacy (IL) of professionals in SM is proposed, and a conceptual framework is put forward. Further, determinants of the IL of safety professionals are suggested, including individual attributes, safety climate and culture, information infrastructure, information technology (IT) human resources, production technology and management, and national information policy, law and ethics. Of course, further research on the IL of safety professionals should be carried out for effective SM.     

国外私人水坝安全管理政策及其对我国的启示

小型水坝数目多 ,分布广 ,安全管理困难。笔者研究了西方发达国家的私人水坝管理政策的基本准则、主要内容、管理方案的选取等问题 ,并针对我国处于产权市场化改革的水利工程的安全管理问题提出了几点具体建议     

An investigation of occupational subgroups with respect to patient safety culture

There are varying views about the consistency of safety culture across a given organisation or industrial sector: some view it as homogeneous, whereas others have suggested the presence of sub-cultures that vary according to the work group or worksite. This paper reports on a study in which job characteristics and safety climate ratings from a sample of British community pharmacists (N = 860) were subjected to a cluster analysis, with the aim of identifying whether discrete groups can be identified on the basis of these ratings. A four-cluster solution was obtained from the analysis. Examination of quantitative and qualitative data from each cluster led to them being identified as: (i) the disenfranchising pharmacy; (ii) the perilous pharmacy; (iii) the safety-focused pharmacy; (iv) the challenging pharmacy. On the basis of the data obtained, safety culture appears to have both characteristics generic to all community pharmacies and characteristics specific to each cluster, with a number of social and organisational factors influencing the culture in any one setting. Implications for the modelling and assessment of safety culture are discussed.     

Process Safety Management (PSM) for managing contractors in process plant

Accidents involving contractors continue to occur with regular frequency. By using the standard set within the PSM 29 CFR 1910.119(h) regulations, it has been identified that certain aspects of the way contractors do work are not up to the stipulated regulatory requirements especially regarding matters like not providing mandatory personal protective equipment (PPE) to the workers, not discussing hazards related to handling procedures with the workforce and improper control of non-routine activities during changes in shifts. The PSM 29 CFR 1910.119(h) regulations promulgated in 1992 provides standards that covered processes to obtain and evaluate data regarding contractors' health and safety programs as well as the contractors' performance evaluation. Many of the accidents involving contractors are direct result of poor training of contractors and/or poor control of the contracted work. Even though most organizations have their own contractor management systems, there are issues in meeting the requirements of PSM. The PSM standard only state “what to do” not “how to do it”. This is known as self-regulatory policy which depends on the industries understanding to interpret the standard that also contribute to this problem. This paper presents a structured and easy technique to plan and implement a practical and comprehensive contractors' management system in process industries that will comply with OSHA CFR 1910.119. A model has been developed based on this technique and its application has been tested in a pilot plant for compliance to PSM regulation. The model is beneficial to the process industries as any deficiencies in the PSM contractors' management program will be highlighted by the model which will then easily correct the identified deficiency so as to minimize and prevent catastrophic accidents.     

The mediating role of psychological capital between perceived management commitment and safety behavior

Introduction: Among attempts that address high incidences of fatalities and injuries in coal mines, increasing attention has been paid to management commitment to complement the traditional focus on technological advances in safety management. However, more research is needed to explain the influence of perceived management commitment, with extant research drawing commonly on Griffin and Neal (2000) to focus on safety knowledge, skills, and motivation. This study draws on social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1986) to investigate psychological capital as a link between thought process and safety behavior. Method: This study uses survey data from 400 frontline workers in China’s coal mines to test hypotheses. Result: Results suggest that perceived management commitment to safety correlates positively with workers’ safety compliance and participation, and four constituents of psychological capital—self-efficacy, hope, optimism, and resilience—explain the influence of perceived management commitment on safety compliance and participation. Practical Applications: Findings offer both researchers and practitioners an explanation of how perceived management commitment influences safety behaviors, and clarify the roles psychological capital constituents play in explaining the influence of perceived management commitment on safety compliance and safety participation.     

管理循环用于安全和环境管理工作的探索

根据国际标准化组织颁布的两个系列标准的特点,分析了如何运用管理循环于安全管理和环境管理实践中,提出了制约因素管理循环,并且阐述了管理职能循环、PDCA循环和制约因素管理循环运用于管理工作实践中三者的关系.     

Factors influencing the implementation of a safety management system for construction sites

The objective of the study was to determine the influential safety factors that governed the success of a safety management system for construction sites. The number of incidences among construction workers and the level of awareness on matters concerning safety were also determined. The study involved a self-administered three-part questionnaire among the workers and interviews with industry experts involved in brick-laying, concreting and in related assorted trades. Part A of the questionnaire concerned personal particulars, Part B involved training and experience and Part C was based on 28 industry-accepted safety factor elements. The construction sites ranged from high rise buildings, landed houses and infrastructure renovation. The sample size was 275. From the survey it was found that the most influential safety factor was personal awareness followed closely by communication. Suggestions and recommendations on equipment design and improved work practices and procedures to improve the efficiency and productivity of construction workers were proposed. Management was urged to get their workers better informed about safety matters.     

移动式承压类特种设备应急平台研发

本文在搭建移动式承压类特种设备应急联动系统的背景下,重点开发移动式承压类特种设备应急平台.该平台是应急联动系统的核心控制部分,可实现危化品车辆管理、在线监测、事故分析、应急救援、统计分析、基础数据管理、系统管理等功能.应急联动系统融入“平战结合”理念,危险发生时,首先,平台从现场侦测装置自动采集数据;其次,启动事故分析和应急救援模块,必要时自动开启喷淋装置;第三,基于模型预测结果生成相应的应急救援方案;最后,发送到手持终端.该系统可以提升移动式承压类特种设备突发事件应急的及时性、科学性和有效性.