CCPS (Center for Chemical Process Safety)

Powders and bulk solids, handled widely in the chemical, pharmaceutical, agriculture, smelting, and other industries present unique fire, explosion, and toxicity hazards. Indeed, substances which are practically inert in consolidated form may become quite hazardous when converted to powders and granules. The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board is currently investigating dust explosions that occured in 2003 at WestPharma, CTA Acoustics, and Hayes-Lemmerz, and is likely to...

First-line managers have to maintain the integrity of facilities, control manufacturing processes, and handle unusual or emergency situations, as well as respond to the pressures of production demand. On a daily basis, they are closest to the operating personnel who may be injured by a process accident, and they are in the best position to spot problem conditions and to act to contain them. This book offers these managers «how-to» information on process safety management program execution in the...

With new and growing interest in dealing with the hazards of reactive chemicals, this book offers guidelines that can significantly reduce the risk or mitigate the severity of accidents associated with storing and handling reactive materials. Necessary elements of a reliable system to prevent equipment or human failures that might lead to a reactive chemical incident are sound and responsible management policies, together with a combination of superior siting, design, fabrication, erection,...

A comprehensive understanding of the potential dangers inherent in warehousing chemicals is the first step in managing the associated risks. Written by industry professionals for warehouse operators, designers, and all who are concerned with the safe warehousing of chemicals, this book offers a performance-based approach to such hazards as health effects, environmental pollution, fire, and explosion, and presents practical means to minimize the risk of these hazards to employees, the surrounding...

This book has been written to address many of the developments since the 1st Edition which have improved how companies survey and select new sites, evaluate acquisitions, or expand their existing facilities. This book updates the appendices containing both the recommended separation distances and the checklists to help the teams obtain the information they need when locating the facility within a community, when arranging the processes within the facility, and when arranging the equipment within...

Prevention, preparedness, response and recovery–the key components of emergency planning–form the major sections of this work. The book first describes PSM (Process Safety Management) as the key to prevention, then goes on to consider the main features of a preparedness program, including recognizing credible incidents, planning practical strategy to deal with these incidents, selecting necessary physical support systems and equipment, and developing a complete emergency response plan. The...

Guidelines for the Management of Change for Process Safety provides guidance on the implementation of effective and efficient Management of Change (MOC) procedures, which can be applied to improve process safety. In addition to introducing MOC systems, the book describes how to design an initial system from scratch, including the scope of the system and the applications over a plant life cycle and the boundaries and overlaps with other process safety management systems. Note: CD-ROM/DVD and...

The second edition of this essential reference updates and combines two earlier titles to capture the many technological advances for predicting the «footprint» of a vapor cloud release. Cited by EPA in its 1996 document, «Off-Site Consequence Analysis Guidance,» the aim of the book is to encourage and facilitate the development and use of dispersion modeling as an everyday tool, providing practical understanding of basic physical and chemical principles, guidance in selecting release scenarios...

This guide provides an overview of methods for estimating the characteristics of vapor cloud explosions, flash fires, and boiling-liquid-expanding-vapor explosions (BLEVEs) for practicing engineers. It has been updated to include advanced modeling technology, especially with respect to vapor cloud modeling and the use of computational fluid dynamics. The text also reviews past experimental and theoretical research and methods to estimate consequences. Heavily illustrated with photos, charts,...

The EPA investigation of a 1994 chemical plant tragedy concluded that «the explosion resulted from a lack of written safe operating procedures…» While good written procedures can't guarantee zero accidents, they can reduce the number of accidents caused by human error. This new book shows how to remedy this problem through selecting and implementing actions that promote safe, efficient operations and maintenance, improve quality, continuity, profitability and cost control, build upon and record...

Incidents That Define Process Safety describes approximately fifty incidents that have had a significant impact on the chemical and refining industries' approaches to modern process safety. Events are described in detail so readers get a fundamental understanding of the root causes, the consequences, the lessons learned, and actions that can prevent a recurrence. There are exhaustive investigative reports about these events, allowing you to apply the resulting safety principles to their current...

Inherently Safer Chemical Processes presents a holistic approach to making the development, manufacture, and use of chemicals safer. It discusses strategies for substituting more benign chemicals at the development stage, minimizing risk in the transportation of chemicals, using safer processing methods at the manufacturing stage, and decommissioning a manufacturing plant. Since the publication of the original concept book in 1996, there have been many developments on the concept of inherent...

Familiarizes the student or an engineer new to process safety with the concept of process safety management Serves as a comprehensive reference for Process Safety topics for student chemical engineers and newly graduate engineers Acts as a reference material for either a stand-alone process safety course or as supplemental materials for existing curricula Includes the evaluation of SACHE courses for application of process safety principles throughout the standard Ch.E. curricula in addition to,...

Layer of protection analysis (LOPA) is a recently developed, simplified method of risk assessment that provides the much-needed middle ground between a qualitative process hazard analysis and a traditional, expensive quantitative risk analysis. Beginning with an identified accident scenario, LOPA uses simplifying rules to evaluate initiating event frequency, independent layers of protection, and consequences to provide an order-of-magnitude estimate of risk. LOPA has also proven an excellent...

An essential guide for recognizing and responding to normalization of deviance to help organizations improve their process safety performance This book provides an introduction and offers approaches for finding and addressing normalization of deviation both in operational and organizational activities. It addresses the initial and long-term effects of normalization of deviations as seen in reduced efficiencies, reduced product quality, extended batch run time, and near miss process safety...

This book provides guidance on characterizing, recognizing, and responding to warning signs to help avoid process incidents and injuries before they occur. The guidance can be used by both process safety management (PSM) professionals in evaluating their processes and PSM systems as well as for operators who are often the frontline defense against process incidents. Warning signs may consist of process deviations or upsets, instrumentation warnings or alarms, past operating history and...

Process vent header collection systems are subject to continually varying compositions and flow rates and thus present significant challenges for safe design. Due to increasingly demanding safety, health, environmental, and property protection requirements, today's industrial designers are faced with the need to create increasingly complex systems for more effective treatment, dispersal, or disposal of process gases. Safe Design and Operation of Process Vents and Emission Control Systems...

The complexity of today's risk decisions is well known. Beyond cost and risk there are many other factors contributing to these decisions, including type of risk (such as human injury or fatality), the economic impact on the local community, profitability, availability of capital, alternatives for reducing or eliminating the risk, costs of implementing alternatives, codes, standards, regulation, and good industry practice. This book presents a large range of decision aids for risk analysts and...