Natural gas pipelines - emergency isolation valves

The recent natural gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, USA has raised an important point. It appears that the company employees had to drive through rush hour traffic for more than an hour to close manual valves to isolate the leaky pipeline.
In any pipeline transporting hazardous material, remotely operated emergency isolation valves must be provided to immediately isolate the supply of the hazardous material safely. Also, test them to ensure they are in operating condition.
Read the full article in this link

Control systems - do not complicate things!

The last decade has seen a huge change in the control systems of process plants with advanced DCS systems and other new technologies being deployed. I personally feel that the onus lies on the customer to implement only what he requires and will be useful to operators during an emergency / for trouble shooting and not to implement the complete solutions that come along with the package. I have seen in many incidents that the cause of the incident was caused by too much information coming to the operator from the system thus overloading him and diminishing his capabilities to act correctly.
I strongly believe in the principle that WE HAVE TO KEEP IT SIMPLE YET FUNCTIONAL!
Why do we have to complicate things and then work on uncomplicating them?
Read an article on the dangers that are brought on by newer technologies and control systems in this link

Run to failure or run to safety?

The Vice President of the USW, a body representing workers has mentions that "the oil industry's run to failure mentality concerning equipment gets worse every day. He also said that the union will not give up its campaign to have enforceable health and safety language.He added that "It's all about money. The refiners run the units longer to sell as much product as possible."
Mr Rafael Moure Eraso chair of the US Chemical Safety Board said that "We see a growing crisis of safety in the oil sector." He cited the Gulf rig disaster as well as recent explosions and fires at onshore production, processing, and refining facilities.
Mr Beevers said that the industry needs to bring back shorter periods between turnovers, which are times when a refinery is shut down for maintenance.
Mr Moure Eraso said that operators have told him that turnarounds that normally occur every two to three years are happening now every four to five years. They have said that broken equipment is not immediately addressed and workers are told to work around the problem".
This is a classical production Vs Safety question. How do you decide the intervals between planned shutdowns for maintenance? Of late, due to market pressures, many organisations are increasing the duration between shutdowns.In the interest of process safety, this decision has to be made very carefully after weighing all options, including ageing of the plant,process incidents and maintenance data.
Read the full article in this link.

Oil fire in pipeline in China

Thanks to NP Rao for sharing this powerpoint show of the firefighters in China fighting the fire and subsequent oil spill in the oil pipeline in China.

Overfilled rail tanker "burps" isobutane!

An incident has been reported in the US where an overfilled rail tanker was overfilled and it appears that the safety valve lifted momentarily, causing what observers report as a burp! A passerby called 911 and the excess isobutane was transferred to a road tanker. Many of the chemicals in India are transferred in rail tankers. Ensure that they are not overfilled. It will not show up immediately but as the day warms up, there is a likelihood of overpressurising of the tanker.
Read more of the news and see the video in this link.

Process safety - Its lonely at the top!

Imagine what Tony Hayward the erstwhile CEO of BP must have gone through following the oil rig accident. In India, prosecutions of the "Occupier" are on the increasing trend. An article mentions that "There are few places on earth more lonely than the space occupied by a corporate executive who is potentially responsible for a process safety mishap resulting in significant injuries to property, the environment and people. Often, support for such executives at that time can be seen by governmental authorities and the public as a failure of the corporation to take responsibility for the consequences of the catastrophic incident. On the other hand, abandoning such individuals in their time of need—particularly as they are subjected to regulatory and criminal investigations and the initiation of civil lawsuits—is seldom in the best interests of the corporation.
The best time to consider these issues is long before the adverse critical incident occurs. Most state laws require indemnification of employees charged with wrongdoing during the course of their employment, as long as those employees are ultimately exonerated. In addition, broad corporate indemnity provisions and directors and officers (D&O) insurance policies are available to protect such employees".
Read the full article in this link

The human consequences of a fire accident

Many chemical plant personnel take work permit systems for granted. It just becomes a piece of paper after some time. From time to time a harsh reality check is required for people to understand the dangers of hot work and working with flammable materials. I came across an article which is an amazing tale of a fire accident survivor who is now a professional speaker. His name is Spencer Beach and he has written a book about his ordeal. He was gravely injured in a fire accident with a solvent/thinner. The photo attached in the article is not for the lighthearted. But I felt that people should realise the human impact of a fire accident. Read more of this article in this link.

Running blind - the dangers of reactive chemistry

There is a lot of ignorance about reaction hazards in the batch processing industry. As long as incidents do not occur, operators of reactors that handle reactive chemicals seem to think that it will never happen to them. The fallacy is that we seem to think that big reactors are safe as they look strong! It is the other way around in reactive chemistry! If you do not know the sizing basis of your cooling/condensing systems, your vent/scrubber systems and details of the reactions you are handling, you are running blind! Read a basic article on dangers of reactive chemistry in this link.

OSHA warns power plant operators on hazards of natural gas purging

Further to the explsoion in a new power plant that occurred due to purging of natural gas lines with natural gas instead of other safer alternatives, OSHA has come out with a warning to all power plant operators. Read it in this link.

Hazardous chemicals lying in Indian Ports

Outlook magazine has brought out an article on the hazardous chemicals lying in various Indian ports. Recently, chlorine gas had leaked from old cylinders in the Mumbai Port. The article mentions that 92.4 metric tonnes of methyl monomer, a toxic compound used for making plastics, has been lying at the New Mangalore port since June this year. The article also mentions that more than 203 metric tonnes of various kinds of hazardous substances lies scattered around Mumbai port; another 200 metric tonnes lies awaiting disposal at the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust. Read the full article in this link

Pesticides - safety and health information

Thanks to Ajay Pancholi for sending the useful link for all health and safety information about pesticides. See this link

Fire in GAIL plant kills one

A fire in a GAIL plant has killed a deputy manager. GAIL is the national distributor of natural gas. The accident happened at their Auraiya plant. Read more of the accident in this link.
Abhay Gujar also sent the news that the fire occurred in the crude hexane reboiler in unit-1 during a routine maintenance operation.
Hope the oil industry safety directorate investigates the incident and puts up the reasons for the incident on their website....