Alarm procedure

Make themselves familiar with fire alarm procedures. 

On-site Accident Detection and Alarm Procedures Identification and Policy for Notification of —Local Authorities —State Authorities —Federal Authorities... 

Define and communicate safe operating limits for all safety-critical equipment and alarm procedures. Ensure that operators are aware of these limits. Assure that operators are rewarded for following the limits and emergency procedures, even when it turns out no emergency existed. Provide for tuning the operating limits and alarm procedures over time as required. 

Alarm procedure— A means of alerting concerned parties to a disaster. Various optical and audible means of alarm are available, including flags, lights, sirens, radio, and telephone. 

The safety of a process can be achieved by inherent (internal) and external means. Inherent safety focuses on the intrinsic properties of a process and attempts to design out hazards rather than trying to control hazards through the application of external protective systems. Inherently safer processes rely on chemistry and physics (properties of materials, quantity of hazardous materials) instead of control systems (interlocks, alarms, procedures) to protect workers, property, and the environment. It would be inappropriate to talk about an inherendy safe process, as an absolute definition of safe is difficult to achieve in this context since risk cannot be reduced to zero. However, one can talk about a process or chemical being inherently safer than other(s). For instance, water can be an extremely hazardous chemical under certain conditions (e.g., floods), but in the context of a chemical process, water is an inherently safer solvent than other chemicals. Trevor Kletz has postulated some basic principles of inherent safety [79,80] that process systems engineers can follow when designing or retrofitting chemical processes. Kletz s inherent safety principles can be summarized as follows ... 

Alarm procedure a means of alerting concerned parties to a disaster various optical and audible means of alarm are available, including flags, lights, sirens, radio, and telephone Alcohol-based hand sanitizers a gel or rub that contains alcohol to reduce the number of viable microorganisms on the hands (60 to 95 percent ethanol or isopropanol)... 

Reliability. Certain controls are only effective if carefiiUy maintained. Whereas a substitution, if appropriately selected, may need monitoring, a control that depends on a sensor operating an alarm may cease to work after it is installed if it is not carefiiUy checked, caUbrated, and repaired. This procedure costs money, time, and supervisory effort, and increases risk. 

Control actions, e.g., provide alarms to indicate things getting out of control define control actions to get back into control. The HAZOP study is not complete until response to actions has been documented. Initial HAZOP planning should establish the management follow-up procedure that will be used. 

Determine process requirements Implement correct procedures Install vapor space analyzers with alarm... 

Inherently Safer A system is inherently safer if it relies on the chemistry and physics (the quantity, properties and conditions of use of the process materials) rather than on control systems, interlocks, alarms and procedures to prevent incidents. 

Checks on the adequacy and location of fire-fighting, emergency rescue and alarm equipment Practice in emergency situations Emergency procedures for Eire/explosion Toxic release Serious accidents Spillage... 

A team consists of two or more people that know the process technology, design, operating procedures, practices, alarms, emergency procedures, test and maintenance procedures, routine and non-routine tasks. They must consider authorization and procurement of parts and supplies, safety and health standards, codes, specifications and regulations. The team leader provides m.iriagcment and goals to the process the team and consultants construct and interpret the analyses. 

Support Systems -fVrKTcdurci . rinil fwni.ihle Lun fiir alJi.-rMii c room cowling on loss of IIVAC I o.pi -Temperature alarm, in mcmi. lo dctc. HVAC(h,p-( - Rcvibc procedures and [raimng lor Jov- c support systems (b,p)... 

Procedures, like equipment, also take time to operate. For example, how long does it take to empty your building when the fire alarm sounds Is this quick enough ... 

Process, hardware, and systems inspections and testing (pre-startup safety review) Maintenance procedures Alarm and instrument management Demolition procedures... 

The other main application area for predictive error analysis is in chemical process quantitative risk assessment (CPQRA) as a means of identifying human errors with significant risk consequences. In most cases, the generation of error modes in CPQRA is a somewhat unsystematic process, since it only considers errors that involve the failure to perform some pre-specified function, usually in an emergency (e.g., responding to an alarm within a time interval). The fact that errors of commission can arise as a result of diagnostic failures, or that poor interface design or procedures can also induce errors is rarely considered as part of CPQRA. However, this may be due to the fact that HEA techniques are not widely known in the chemical industry. The application of error analysis in CPQRA will be discussed further in Chapter 5. 

The separation plant had been running smoothly for several weeks and the planned shutdown was some time away. On the day of the incident a number of unusual events occurred which contributed to its development. Shortly after the start of his day shift, the control room operator received a high vibration alarm from booster pump A in the crude fluid separation building. Following normal procedure, he switched over to the standby pump (pump B), switched off pump A, and told his supervisor of the alarm. The supervisor subsequently organized a work permit for work to be carried out on pump A by the day shift maintenance team. The permit was issued and repair work... 

While waiting for reply high high gas alarm went off (approx. 22 35) so he immediately started safety shutdown procedure. Explosion occurred while he was doing this. 

No alarm system, however well planned and installed, can be completely reliable or tamperproof. The successful operation of a security system requires the active cooperation of those involved in carrying out the necessary procedures carefully and thoroughly. The usefulness of the whole system can be jeopardized by lack of care or inadequate attention to routine procedures in maintenance and servicing. This care has to be extended to the security of keys and of information regarding the system, its installation and method of operation. 

Maximum demand alarms are available for individual organizational use and these can be made to shut down non-essential plant in order to maintain a lower actual maximum demand. Where automatic shutdown is not in use alarms can be used to trigger a manual shutdown procedure. 

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