PROCESS SAFETY
OUR SERVICES
- Compatibility Study
- Preliminary Hazard Analysis (PHA)
- Hazard and Operability Study (HAZOP)
- Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA)
- Hazard Analysis and the Critical Control Points (HACCP)
- Fault Tree Analysis (FTA)
- Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA)
- Risk Management Plan (RMP)
- Inherent Safety
- Consequence Analysis for Events with Flammable and Toxic Chemicals
- Equipment and Process Plants Reliability Studies
- Control of Static Electricity in Chemical Plants
- Training and Information Courses in the Risk Assessment and Management Techniques
- Safety Integrity Level (SIL) Assessment
- Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA)
Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA)
As long as all the human activities involve risk, we have to adopt criteria in order to relativize the risk inherent to the industrial activities. The risk components are the possibility of an undesirable event occurs (expressed as a frequency or likelihood) and the probability of specific consequences caused by this event (e.g.: fatal injury). Then, we can say that:
RISK [ Frequency of event ] x [ Probability of consequences ]
A risk assessment thus demands concerns both to the event and the consequences. This concern may vary from qualitative judgments based on experience, semi-quantitative estimates and even detailed calculated predictions. A complete quantitative risk assessment (QRA) involves the detailed calculation of both the components and therefore is very time-consuming. The calculation of one of them with the judgment of the other may be enough in many cases, with a reasonable saving of efforts. As a rule, the level of consideration (from qualitative to quantitative) should be taken into account only to the necessary extent to resolve the specific issue.
The consequences can be assessed by the effect on people, such as injuries or fatalities; by the effect on the property, such as equipment or facilities damages; by the effect on the environment, such as rivers or soil contamination. The most likely events to cause some off-site effect in the chemical industry are fire, explosion and toxic gas emission.