(152b) Analysis of One Company's Process Safety Incidents

Over 100 process safety incidents covering a multi-year period were collected and reviewed for trends. This paper presents the results of the review. The incidents were broken into 3 categories; spills/releases, reactive chemical and fires/explosions. Information obtained included causes and consequences of the incidents, recurring types of incidents, the Process Safety Management principles implicated, the type of unit operation or activity going on and the phase of operation at the time of the incident. Patterns of causes, consequences and PSM principles involved were found within the three categories. The information led to the establishment of a formal process safety incident reporting procedure within the company.