A ranking of safety journals using different measurement methods

Using an online survey, we asked safety researchers around the globe how they perceived the quality of a list of 35 representative safety journals. We found that the most well-respected journal by expert opinion was the Journal of Loss Prevention in the Process Industries. However, taking both the respondents’ results and the citation-based results into consideration, the Journal of Hazardous Materials is the most influential journal, followed by Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Risk Analysis, Accident Analysis and Prevention and Safety Science.     

Decision support systems for major accident prevention in the chemical process industry: A developers’ survey

Solid major accident prevention management is characterized by efficient and effective risk assessments. As a means of addressing the efficiency aspect, decision support analysis software is becoming increasingly available. This paper discusses the results of a survey of decision support tools for investigating (internal and external) major hazards in the chemical industry. The most significant features, such as the usability and the functionality of the toolkits are discussed. Toolkit characteristics are analyzed in the light of the different major risk decision process stages. Consequently, valuable supportive information for company decision makers purchasing such software is given. Furthermore, conclusions are drawn and recommendations are formulated for establishing priorities for future risk toolkits developments.     

Optimizing and balancing operational manning levels and SHEQ within chemical companies

Many chemical organizations are struggling with efficiently optimizing their operational manning levels due to a lack of management insights in the subject. However, manning levels not reflecting real circumstances and not taking into account various possible accident scenarios can be financially adversarial and can even lead to (minor and major) accidents. This paper suggests a performance-based methodology to assist chemical plants in their efforts to systematically improve operational manning levels. By integrating manning level standards with the Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle of continuous improvement and providing a generic action plan for any organization to elaborate an efficient means of improving manning level performance, operational manning levels can be advanced without having to undergo a costly and inefficient trial-and-error phase.     

A Threat Assessment Review Planning (TARP) decision flowchart for complex industrial areas

Planning Threat Assessments (TAs) within an area consisting of numerous chemical installations, should be part of adequate and sound Management Of Change procedures (including a baseline periodic TA, on top of change control) of every company belonging to the chemical and process industries. This paper discusses the optimization of threat assessment planning activities. By establishing a planning procedure that objectively determines the need for TAs for all kinds of threats, correct, updated and consistent information becomes easily available to the company's security management department. Threat assessments to be carried out in each facility belonging to an organization can thus easily be scheduled on an organization-wide scale. A prioritization can be made considering legislative requirements, the type of threats, the type of assessment to be carried out, the availability of external experts, etc.     

DomPrevPlanning: User-friendly software for planning domino effects prevention

Chains of accidents, in literature generally referred to as domino effects, knock-on effects, cascade effects or escalation effects occur very infrequently but with disastrous consequences. There exist very few software packages to study such domino accidents in complex industrial areas and to forecast potential catastrophes caused by secondary order (involving a sequence of three installations submitted to two consecutive accidents), tertiary order or even higher order accidents. Moreover, available domino software focuses on risk assessment and on consequence assessment. None of these toolkits specifically addresses the prioritization of installation sequences in an industrial area in order to facilitate objective prevention decisions about domino effects. This paper describes the application of a new computer-automated tool designed to support decision-making on preventive and protective measures to alleviate domino effects in a complex surrounding of chemical installations. Using a holistic approach and thus looking at the entire industrial area as a whole, all sequences of three installations in the area are ranked according to their danger contribution to domino effects. An example of a cluster of chemical plants demonstrates the level of qualitative and quantitative input data required. The example is also used to explain the toolkit results, as well as the surplus value and the benefits for company safety managers and regulators.