Revolutionizing safety and security in the chemical and process industry: applying the CHESS concept

This paper argues that a new concept, summarized as ‘CHESS’, should be used in the chemical industry to further substantially advance safety (where we use the term in a broad sense, that is, safety and physical security, amongst others). The different domains that need to be focused upon, and where innovative initiatives should be taken are...

Developing a barrier management framework for dealing with Natech domino effects and increasing chemical cluster resilience

A domino effect triggered by a natural event (a so-called Natech domino effect) represents a typical high-impact low-probability (HILP) event, which may lead to catastrophic consequences. The presence of safety barriers could have an impact on the effects by impeding propagation patterns and mitigating potential consequences. However,...

Safety barrier performance assessment by integrating computational fluid dynamics and evacuation modeling for toxic gas leakage scenarios

Toxic gas leakage represents a type of major process accident scenario threatening human life. Technical and non-technical safety barriers are employed to prevent toxic gas leakage accidents or mitigate the possible catastrophic consequences. Evacuation must be executed in severe toxic gas release scenarios. The performance assessment of...

Cost-effective maintenance of safety and security barriers in the chemical process industries via genetic algorithm

Chemical plants face safety hazards and security threats that may induce catastrophic scenarios. Safety and security barriers are employed widely to protect chemical plants from accidental and intentional undesired events and mitigate consequences. Managing safety and security barriers effectively and economically is a research topic with...