Chronicles of security risk assessment in process industries: Past,present and future perspectives

Security incidents around the world causes enormous loss in terms of life, economy, and environment. The 9/11 ′triggered the serious onset of research initiatives in the field of security with a more specific focus on the protection of high sensitive and hazardous facilities. It is well known that technology is advancing in a very rapid phase, proportionally increasing the security risk of the facilities. Conventional deterministic risk techniques widely found their applications in the earlier stage but owing to the increasing dynamic nature of the security risk, probabilistic dynamic risk assessment models were developed over time. In this article, the authors attempted to present the evolution of security risk concepts, their present status, and their future scope in a precise and consolidated form. The last 20 years of development in the security risk assessment concept involving deterministic and dynamic risk assessment models and applications in security risk assessment relevant to physical security are discussed in this article. The objective of the article is to outline the past, current and future directions of security risk highlighting their strength, weakness and limitations.     

Cultural Ergonomics in Ghana,West Africa: A Descriptive Survey of Industry and Trade Workers’ Interpretations of Safety Symbols

Globalization and technology transfer have led to the diffusion of risk communications to users from cultures that were not initially viewed as the target users. This study examined industry and trade workers’ overall impressions of symbols used to convey varying degrees of hazardousness. Six symbols, including symbols from the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) Z535 Standard (ANSI, 1998) and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 3864:1984 Standard (ISO, 1984) were selected. With the exception of the SKULL symbol, results showed wide discrepancies between users’ perceptions of the symbols and their intended meanings. Implications for cross-cultural research on warning components and risk communications are discussed.     

海外石油工程公共安全风险预警方法研究

近年来,我国海外石油工程项目蓬勃发展的同时,面临公共安全极大挑战。现阶段我国石油企业的公共安全风险管理体系不尽完善,此方面的研究重点主要集中在应急救援等领域,为了及时应对复杂多变的公共安全风险,开展公共安全风险预警研究有着重要的现实意义。综合考虑现阶段海外石油工程项目面临的公共安全风险现状,从社会安定、自然灾害、公共卫生、事故灾难和综合管理五个方面系统分析其存在的公共安全风险,借助层次分析法和模糊综合评判,建立并计算公共安全风险预警指标体系的标准权重,确定预警评判集,最终提出一种海外石油工程公共安全风险预警方法,并给出应用步骤。将该风险预警方法运用到非洲某国,结果显示,与实际高度吻合,具有实际应用价值。     

New methodologies for security risk assessment of oil and gas industry

The oil and gas industry forms a vital and large part of the economy of any country. It provides crucial support to transport, manufacturing and energy sectors, produces valuable exports and provides huge employment. This industry along with fertilizer plants, petrochemical plants, etc., which handle hazardous chemicals, are potential targets for deliberate actions by terrorists, criminals and disgruntled employees. The process industries face different levels of threats. It is imperative to analyze the entire threat scenario before taking steps to counter it, otherwise each and every threat will have to be treated as most severe, thus resulting in a huge and wasteful expenditure.The Security Risk Factor Table (SRFT) and a Stepped Matrix Procedure (SMP) have been developed to assess the security risk of oil and gas industry as well as the other chemical process industries. While the SRFT deals with the effects of individual threats, the SMP deals with the cascading/domino effects which a lone, low probability event can cause. A case study of a refinery has been performed to show the application of the ideas presented.     

Evaluation of process safety indicators collected in conformance with ANSI/API Recommended Practice 754

At the request of the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), we examined some of the possible uses of the process safety event metrics proposed by the American Petroleum Institute and published as ANSI/API Recommended Practice 754. We examined many sources to try to estimate what the likely number of Tier 1 and Tier 2 process safety events would be at refineries. Then we calculated the statistical power that would be available to compare rates, both over time and across facilities and firms. As Tier 1 and Tier 2 are defined, it appears that the event frequencies estimated for U.S. refineries (i.e., 0.12 per 100 employees for Tier 1 and 0.26 for Tier 2) would make it unlikely that even two-fold differences in the rates would be statistically significant, except at large refineries with several thousand workers.     

Damage to offshore oil and gas facilities following hurricanes Katrina and Rita: An overview

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the centre of the American petrochemical industry, shutting down eight refineries, hundreds of oil-drilling and production platforms, and many other industrial facilities. Furthermore, it triggered unprecedented numbers of hazardous-materials releases from industrial facilities and storage terminals onshore, as well as from oil and gas production facilities offshore in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM). In this paper, we analyse the damage caused by the two hurricanes on the offshore oil and gas industry. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita caused the largest number of destroyed and damaged platforms and pipelines, and the highest number of mobile offshore drilling units set adrift in the history of GoM operations. Following the hurricanes, changes have been proposed to operating and emergency procedures, maintenance requirements, and design practices including mooring practices for mobile offshore drilling units.     

A comprehensive approach to API RP 752 and 753 building siting studies

Facility siting studies are an important part of process safety, and are required for facilities that fall under OSHA’s PSM program. Facility siting is frequently interpreted as performing a building siting study which adheres to the guidance given in API RP 752. Building siting may also consider siting of temporary or portable buildings based on the guidance in API RP 753. While both API RP 752 and API RP 753 provide a framework and some guidance for performing building siting studies, they do not provide detailed methodologies or provide guidance on performing a detailed analysis. As a result many building siting studies are inconsistent in their overall approach, or in the way they address hazards. Due to the recent scrutiny applied to building siting studies, more attention has been given to provide evaluations which correctly describe the range of hazards that may affect an occupied building at a petrochemical facility. This paper outlines a comprehensive methodology for performing building siting studies at such facilities. The methodology addresses the applicable hazards and the available tools by which the potential impacts to building occupants can be evaluated.     

API standard 521 guidance on mixing of hot/cold liquids and prevention of superheat limit explosions

American Petroleum Institute (API) standards and recommended practices have identified inadvertent mixing of hot and cold liquids as a potential cause for equipment overpressure since 1955. The limited guidance has been informative but provides minimal if any details on conditions that could cause an overpressure and its potential severity. Therefore, the user must interpret how and when to prevent and/or mitigate the scenario. This guidance has changed little over the years. In June 2020, API published the 7th Edition of API Standard 521 which now provides specific guidance as to conditions whereby pressure relief devices can be considered for protection and conditions where prevention remains as the only recourse. This paper discusses the basis for the revised guidance in API Standard 521 and includes supplemental guidance.     

油田工程建设安全管理策略和实践

委内瑞拉石油工业有100多年的历史,安全环保法规体系完备,媒体等第三方舆论监管得力。在这样的外部环境下,从事石油作业,必须坚持高标准、严要求,慎重对待工程建设过程中的每一个安全问题。结合项目自身特点和当地外部环境,在石油工程建设的各个方面,应用推广了多种安全风险分析控制方法,使项目安全管理更加科学、更加有效,保证工程建设项目安全顺利完成。     

Site security for chemical process industries

Chemical process industries such as oil refineries, fertiliser plants, petrochemical plants, etc., which handle hazardous chemicals, are potential targets for deliberate actions by terrorists, criminals and disgruntled employees. Security risks arising out of these threats are real and must be assessed to determine whether the security measures employed within the facility are adequate or need enhancement. The essential steps involved are threat analysis, vulnerability analysis, security countermeasures, and emergency response. Threat analysis involves the study of identifying sources, types of threats, and their likelihood. Vulnerability analysis identifies the weaknesses in a system that adversaries can exploit. Depending on the threat likelihood and vulnerabilities, various security countermeasures are suggested to improve the plant security. Appropriate emergency response measures that could mitigate the consequences of a successful attack and concepts of inherently safer processes in the light of process security are also discussed in the paper. It is recognised that serious terrorist threats exist to the transport system of hazardous chemicals (by road, rail cars, ships, pipelines, etc.). However, that is not a part of this study, which concentrates on process plants and hazardous materials within immovable boundaries. A case study of a fertiliser plant is used to show the application of ideas presented.     

Windows系统端口安全和防护

针对Windows系统端口的安全 ,介绍端口的基本特征和用途 ;分析木马和病毒等诸多因素对端口的威胁 ;论述端口关闭的方法和原则 ,而该原则是只开放需要的端口 ,以获得最大程度减小被攻击的可能性 ;最后重点阐述端口管理在安全指南软件中的实现 ,希望达到的目的是使不同层次的计算机用户、特别是缺少基本计算机操作和端口安全知识的用户 ,在该软件的指导下都能正确、顺利地管理端口 ,保障微机和网络安全。     

Application of risk based inspection in refinery and processing piping

In refineries and processing plants, the enormous amount of piping is more complex in distribution than other types of equipment. In general, compared with other types of equipment in these industries, more difficulty in inspection planning is encountered.

However, under-inspection or over-inspection can occur due to the lack of jurisdictional requirements on the inspection interval and method for piping, or the inspection interval being based only on piping service classifications in the existing regulations, such as API 570. This can result in unacceptable risks, along with costly loss of resources.

To lessen the piping risk level, more and more companies have adopted and applied risk based inspection (RBI) methodology, leading to risk reduction and cost benefits since the last decade. This study applied RBI methodology to optimize the inspection strategy of the piping in a refinery and petrochemical plants in Taiwan. Two actual case studies were corroborated better with quantitative RBI methodology than without the methodology in terms of risk and cost reductions.     

民用机场空防安全的风险管理研究

主要通过对民用机场空防安全存在的风险从作业人员、设备和设施、环境、管理等4方面进行识别;以系统的观点为基础,结合相关法规,建立空防安全风险评价指标体系;运用AHP方法对民用机场的空防安全进行风险研究,并通过研究、分析计算数据,查找、预测民用机场空防系统中存在的一些不足和缺陷;针对机场保安、管理、规章制度等方面的不足,结合中国民航和民用机场的现状及实际情况提出相应的建议性措施,以期达到最低事故率、最少损失和最优的安全投资效益。     

Terror-Proofing Chemical Process Industries

The chemical process industries (CPI) handling hazardous chemicals can be rather attractive targets for deliberate adversarial actions by terrorists, criminals and disgruntled employees. The damage inflicted may include casualties, economic loss and political fallout. There is an urgent need for each facility to have a security management programme. Its essential components are security risk assessment, security countermeasures and emergency response.

Security risk assessment can be carried out qualitatively by threat analysis, vulnerability analysis and developing a Security Risk Factor Table (SRFT). All these are discussed at length. Security countermeasures are the steps taken to strengthen the weak points in a system, either by lessening vulnerabilities or by hardening the facilities. Various security countermeasures are suggested for improving security of CPI. Appropriate emergency response measures that could mitigate the consequences of a successful attack are also discussed in the paper. It is recommended that many of the conventional safety and security measures adopted thus far may have to be modified in light of the enhanced and complex nature of the present security threats.     

论城市公共安全的风险管理

从城市公共安全风险管理系统的研究出发,结合城市公共安全管理的特点,从城市工业危险源、公共场所、公共设施、公共卫生、自然灾害、生态环境、恐怖袭击等存在的风险,探讨其风险的特点;提出风险管理的步骤和原则;强调我国已进入风险社会和加强城市公共安全风险管理的重要性;指出了我国城市公共安全风险管理存在的问题,简单介绍了美国、日本、英国、俄罗斯等国家风险管理的经验;就我国城市公共安全风险管理现状,提出具体对策并构建了城市公共安全风险管理的基本框架。重点阐述了城市公共安全管理的内涵、现状、存在问题和应对措施并指出建立完善的城市公共安全管理体系是做好城市公共安全风险管理的有效办法。     

新旧版美国四轮全地形车安全标准ANSI/SVIA 1分析与研究

本文通过对美国四轮ATV强制性安全标准ANSI/SVIA 1-2010与ANSI/SVIA 1-2007的分析研究,阐述了2010版标准中许多修改内容是对2007版标准编辑性的修改,其目的是改善标准清晰度和一致性;实质性修改主要包括8项,其目的主要是适应安全性要求。同时也提出我国ATV产品在设计、配置和性能等方面面临的技术壁垒和安全技术改进方向,这对我国ATV产品出口美国和制定国家、行业标准具有重要指导意义。     

石化企业危险化工工艺风险等级评估指标体系研究

随着石化企业的迅猛发展,危险化学品的用量不断增加,生产工艺和条件也越趋苛刻,在带来巨大经济效益的同时,也存在重大安全事故隐患,因此石化企业危险工艺的风险评估显得尤为重要。考虑到目前国内还没有能够比较科学完整地评估石化企业危险化工工艺风险等级的安全评价方法,在国家安监总局划分的15种危险化工工艺的基础上,根据危险化工工艺表征涉及的影响因素,结合化工工艺的实际情况,选择具有典型代表意义的重要性评价指标作为研究对象,将危险化工工艺风险等级分为工艺固有危险性以及安全补偿两部分,其中固有危险性又分为目标层、准则层和因素层3个层次。采用理论分析法与专家咨询法筛选指标,最终建立了由67个具体指标组成的动态指标体系,从而为政府和企业加强安全管理提供了便利,进一步实现石化企业的本质安全化。     

旅游安全风险系统研究

在现代旅游活动中,旅游安全问题日益突出。其活动涉及大、中、小尺度的地域范围,牵涉行业较多,旅游安全存在于旅游行业及其活动的各个环节。当前的旅游安全问题不仅仅是个技术问题,而已成为一个很严重的社会问题。笔者从系统论和旅游地理学的角度,把旅游安全作为一个风险系统进行研究;认为旅游安全风险系统是由旅游者与旅游景区环境共同组成的一个复杂的特定的相互依赖的系统;初步探讨旅游安全风险系统的组成、结构和研究内容;对旅游安全风险系统的安全分析、安全评价和安全措施进行了相关研究;通过研究,以期弄清现代旅游业发展中存在的安全问题,提出旅游安全风险对策。     

HSE管理中的风险分析方法——以中油国际委内瑞拉公司HSE管理经验为例

HSE管理的出发点应是预防为主。因此尽早识别风险、评估可能的风险是HSE管理的关键。风险分析最重要的是要承认：石油勘探开发活动不可能绝对安全，风险总是客观存在的。风险分析就是尽早识别、分析和评估可能的风险所在、大小和频率。风险管理就是在风险分析的基础上，采取有针对性地措施将风险消减到可接受的水平。本文在总结近年国内外HSE管理中风险分析方法的基础上，结合CNPC在委内瑞拉运行石油项目的经验，提出了一套风险分析的定性和定量方法，包括系统风险分析、节点风险分析、概率统计分析等。由于大力推广和应用这些方法，使CNPC在委内瑞拉运行石油项目9年来没有发生任何HSE大事故，被委内瑞拉国家石油公司誉为“国际石油投资者HSE工作的典范”。