Operating personnel

The purpose of chemical processes is not to make chemicals The purpose is to make money. However, the profit must he made as part of a sustainable industrial activity which retains the capacity of ecosystems to support industrial activity and life. This means that process waste must be taken to its practical and economic minimum. Relying on methods of waste treatment is usually not adequate, since waste treatment processes tend not so much to solve the waste problem but simply to move it from one place to another. Sustainable industrial activity also means that energy consumption must be taken to its practical and economic minimum. Chemical processes also must not present significant short-term or long-term hazards, either to the operating personnel or to the community. 

Personnel Selection and Training. The quaHty of operating personnel is of paramount importance to the safe operation of a chemical plant. Operators must be intelligent and emotionally stable. Excessive use of alcohol and dmgs affects reHabiHty and can thereby render workers more susceptible to certain types of toxic exposure. Thorough medical screening is essential to avoid damaging exposures to susceptible individuals, eg, people with respiratory ailments should not be employed in areas where corrosive atmospheres could occur. 

Cascade control strategies are among the most popular and usehil process control strategies. Modem control systems have made thek implementation and operation both easier from the standpoint of operations personnel, and cost effective as they are implemented in software rather than hardwiring the connections. 

The weight of material in the buckets on the loaded side of an elevator chain causes the elevator to momentarily mn backwards if, during operation, the power is intermpted or there is a failure in the driving system. Because this could be a ha2ard to operating personnel, as well as damage to the elevator, a backstop, similar to that described for a belt conveyor, should be used. 

The radiological hazard of tritium to operating personnel and the general population is controlled by limiting the rates of exposure and release of material. Maximum permissible concentrations (MPC) of radionucHdes were specified in 1959 by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (79). For purposes of control all tritium is assumed to be tritiated water, the most readily assimilated form. The MPC of tritium ia breathing air (continuous exposure for 40 h/wk) is specified as 185 kBq/mL (5 p.Ci/mL) and the MPC for tritium in drinking water is set at 3.7 GBq/mL (0.1 Ci/mL) (79). The maximum permitted body burden is 37 MBq (one millicurie). Whenever bioassay indicates this value has been exceeded, the individual is withdrawn from further work with tritium until the level of tritium is reduced. 

An expert system is a computer program that uses an experts knowledge in a particular domain to solve a narrowly focused, complex problem. An off-line system uses information entered manually and produces results in visual form to guide the user in solving the problem at hand. An on-line system uses information taken direc tly from process measurements to perform tasks automatically or instruct or alert operating personnel to the status of the plant. 

Implementation of process interlocks within process control systems is perfectly acceptable. Furthermore, it is also permissible (and probably advisable) that responsible operations personnel be authorized to bypass or ignore a process. Safety interlocks must be implemented within the separate safety interlock system. Bypassing or ignoring safety interlocks by operations personnel is simply not permitted. When this is necessary for ac tions such as verifying that the interlock continues to be func tional, such situations must be infrequent and incorporated into the design of the interlock. 

Poor reputation. In the past, electric tracing has been less than reliable. Due to past failures, some operating personnel are unwilling to take a chance on any electric tracing. 

During operation the plant is in the hands of the operating personnel. They should be properly trained and familiar with the inst lation. Very often, accidents are caused by an improper practice, such as making an attempt to repair when proper preparation is not made. Operators shoiild be trained in first-aid procedures and how to respond to emergencies. 

It is important to note that vahdation typicahy only brings a measurement under suspicion. It does not verify that the measurement is incorrect. Safety is paramount. Some vahdation analysis could result in concluding that the measurement is invalid when, in fact, the comparison information is invahd. It is not difficult to extrapolate that actions could result from this erroneous conclusion which would place maintenance and operating personnel in jeopardy. Validation merely raises suspicion it does not confirm errors or measurement. 

Primary concerns include the of loss of containment and the potential for exposure of operating personnel to hazardous materials the potential for other hazards such as fires or explosions and the ergonomic issues inherent in manipulating large, heavy containers. The first two concerns are of particular significance in batch operations, since operating personnel are often more frequently and more intimately exposed to the batch processes than is typically the case with continuous processes. 

If a toll process falls under the U.S. PSM or RMP regulations, it is a requirement to document the identity of the employee, the date of the training, and the means used to verify that the employee understood the training. Even when not required by regulations, this documentation will enable the toller to demonstrate a commitment to maintaining competent operating personnel. 

If a PSSR is extensive, the PSSR team should include a toller company engineer and an engineer from the client. In addition, an operations supervisory representative and operations personnel with appropriate knowledge and skills along with a maintenance and safety representative may also be included on the team. The PSSR leader must ensure enough manpower and expertise is available on the team to review the new facilities and major modifications thoroughly. 

Longitudinal voltage (Source of danger to the telephone equipment and operating personnel)... 

It provides complete protection for operating personnel troni high touch or step voltages (for details on contact voltages, see Section 22.9) across the enclosure and the metallic structures caused by parasitic (electromagnetic) currents. 

Frequency Phase 3 Use Branch Point Estimates to Develop a Ere-quency Estimate for the Accident Scenarios. The analysis team may choose to assign frequency values for initiating events and probability values for the branch points of the event trees without drawing fault tree models. These estimates are based on discussions with operating personnel, review of industrial equipment failure databases, and review of human reliability studies. This allows the team to provide initial estimates of scenario frequency and avoids the effort of the detailed analysis (Frequency Phase 4). In many cases, characterizing a few dominant accident scenarios in a layer of protection analysis will provide adequate frequency information. 

Third, you would. suppose that parallel pumps are identical, that they were manufactured and assembled together. But it is possible that one pump of the pair is the dominant pump and the other is the runt pump. If you start the dominant pump first in the parallel system, and then decide to add the runt pump of the pair, the weaker pump may not be able to open the check valve. The pump operator perceives that the flow meter on the second pump is stuck or broken. This is because the second pump might be dead heading against a closed check valve, maintained that w ay by the dominant pump. If this situation exists, it may re.sult in premature failure of bearings and. seals, leading maintenance and operations personnel thinking that parallel pumps are problematic. 

The monitoring software for every system will be different. However, all software is there to achieve one goal—it must gather data, ensure that it is correct, and then analyze and diagnose the data. Presentations must be in a convenient form and should be easily understood by plant operational personnel. All priorities must be to the data collection process. This process must not in any manner be hampered since it is the corner stone of the whole system. 

An in-house website, eataloging experienees and speeial maintenanee teehniques should be updated and available for the entire eorporation espeeially maintenanee and operation personnel. These websites should be full of illustrations, short, and to the point. 

When the number of operators per shift has been estimated, multiply the number by five to get the total operating personnel to cover all shifts. This provides for days off, some training, and sick leave. The price per person must be estimated for the project location. Fringes, taxes, and other overheads must be added. 

This graphical method was developed for field operations personnel. It is designed for sour natural gas at 100 to 4,000 psia up to 50% H2S or sweet gas with C3 up to 10%. 

To apply inherent safety appropriately, research chemists must make an in-depth investigation into the process chemistry and into the entire process that may develop based on that chemistry. An adequate investigation necessitates input from a diverse team of people, including research chemists and business, engineering, safety, environmental personnel. They must consider the impact that the use of a particular process chemistry will have on a wide range of populations. These include the ultimate customer of the product, process operating personnel, the general public, and potentially impacted plant and animal populations. To chose the "inherently safest chemistry, the team needs to take into account ... 

The what if/checklist is a broadly based hazard assessment technique that combines the creative thinking of a selected team of specialists with the methodical focus of a prepared checklist. The result is a comprehensive hazard analysis that is useful in training operating personnel on the hazards of the particular operation. 

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