Safe Processing Environment

A safe runtime-environment is for safety-related applications need safety-qualifier to show if the relevant data provide the sufficient safely integrity for a safe user-apphcation. 

In case of any safety-related absolute or Sequent lime constraints, at least a safety-related time monitor needs to be implemented. This lime monitor could be used to trigger a watchdog so that the system could be degraded in a safe state by a consoller shut-down. If a shut-down of the controller isn t the safe state, for example in fail-operational systems such degradations don t provide any safe reactions. 

In case of soS real-time safety requirements such a monitor could change periodization for the scheduler, so that safety-critical tasks get processed. In case of deterministic up-date of e.g. sensor data at the run-time environment information could be used to identify delayed information. In this case the application could provide adequate safely-related function, so that the given safety-requirements would not be violated. 

Such principles could also run on task level, so that 3 dissimilar tasks provide adequate safety-related control information and by 2oo3 voting the actuator (or any output) provides the control information. In a single microcontroller application. 

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Protect Workers and the Public. The reasons may not be eniirely altruistic because worker injury is detrimental to production. Furthermore, we are the workers and wish a safe working environment free of immediate or latent injury. This requires detailed analysis of the process systems to estimate frequency of failure and the consequences that could result. Generally if the workers are safe, the public is safe. 

The records of all tests, inspections, analyses, and demonstrations should be generated which demonstrate that the process is safe, meets environment legislation, is reliable, stable, capable, and maintainable and produces products that meet engineering standards. The next step is product approval. 

These improvements are more likely to occur at the program and element level. For example, at one chemical company a group of senior operators took an initiative to redesign the work permit process that reduced the number of forms required, reduced the time required to issue a permit from an average of two hours to 30 minutes and improved the workplace monitoring needed to ensure a safe work environment. The reduction in the time to issue permits increased maintenance productivity by at least 10 percent, by reducing maintenance worker time spent waiting for permits. This more responsive system also reduced the number of instances where work went ahead without the appropriate permit. 

A short account of the major considerations for the assurance of a safe working environment follows. This account provides perspective on the culture of safety needed in a chemical process development organization. 

Housekeeping in the process industry is basically the same as housekeeping in the home. In order to maintain a safe, orderly environment workers must keep their work areas (control room and outside unit area) neat, clean, and uncluttered. Good housekeeping accomplishes the following goals ... 

A medical examination screening process, required by some employers, to determine if prospective or current employees have or currently utilize drugs that may contribute negatively to a healthy and safe work environment due to their influence on the individual. 

The act or process of laying out, or planning in detail, to show the arrangement of equipment and other elements of a facility to establish a safe working environment. Factor of Safety (FS)... 

Because employers differ in their abilities to reduce injury risk and workers differ in their attitudes regarding such risk, no single probability of a work-related injury is optimal for all parties. Here we describe the process generating labor market equilibrium when workers have differing views about risk and firms have differing capacities to produce safe work environments. 

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 ... 

It is essential to have a safe process during the whole bioplastic life cycle. PHB has been described as the first real thermoplastic example obtained from a biotechnological process that is actually biodegradable. Although PHB is stable in a natural environment, its degradability rate is very high under processing and fusion conditions. 

With an effective safety culture, supervision means correcting safety issues before punishing an employee. When the relationship between employees and management is open and interactive via employee participation, safety issues are discussed and solutions are mutually agreed upon. There is buy-in into the process. This type of relationship fosters a safe work environment and changes in culture where the need for disciplinary action is not needed. When discipline is needed, the parties are more likely to perceive it as corrective rather than punitive [2]. 

Leaders will be eager to coach, counsel, and inspire employees to act and work safely. The environment they create will be one where employees actively participate in the safety process and consider the process their own. 

The philosophy behind most modern safety programs involves the prevention of accidents. Successful accident prevention depends on three basic elements safe working environments, safe working practices, and effective leadership. Safety programs for process technicians usually include elements of the following topics ... 

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