How to make hazardous areas safer without any increase in costs

How to make Hazardous Areas safer-without increasing the cost of safety

Introduction

Hazardous Areas are typically found in large facilities like oil and offshore oil & gas platforms, oil refineries, chemical processing plants, tank farms, supertankers, other ships that carry petrochemical cargo and even places like grain silos, which have the risk of explosion or fire due to explosive mixtures of vapors or dusts. Hazardous Areas are also referred to as "Classified Locations" in North America.

This article is a short guide to how these areas can be made safer, without any increase in costs.

How are areas classified?

Hazardous Areas in a typical facility are classified on two aspects. One is the probability of a flammable, or explosive mixture (this includes dusts too), being present in that area and secondly, the type of the material being present. Hence classification entails specifying the area (known as Area Classification) as well as the material (Material Classification). A third parameter, temperature is also important and Temperature classification, is also carried out. An equipment then, carries a marking which shows the Area, Material and Temperature classification for which it can be installed safely, i.e. without the risk of explosion hazard.

Area Classification is not a permanent thing

Most area classification studies are done during the design stage.This is not always followed up with periodic audits of whether the previous area classification still holds good or not (due to plant modifications).

Sometimes, the basis of the area classification is not understood by the people who actually operate the plant, resulting in the original design being no longer valid. This is not a one-off possibility, it happens many times. Unfortunately it may also result in a disaster.

Actual Case Study

The US Chemical Safety Board recently posted a few videos of investigations regarding actual disasters related to chemical plants on its own website, as well as YouTube. One of these videos relates to the explosion at a paint & ink manufacturing facility at Danversport, Massachusetts. If you watch the video, posted below, you will realise that the root cause of the accident seems to be inadequate ventilation. Apparently, the original design engineers had built in the forced ventilation to reduce the area classification from say Division 1 to Division 2 or possibly from Division 2 to Safe (the latter seems more likely). This "safe area" classification will no longer hold true if the ventilation is switched off. However, these key facts were not communicated to anybody. Of course all of this is conjecture, but perhaps you can view the video and draw your own conclusions.

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Why poor area classification increases costs , reduces safety and generally is bad for the plant operation

How you classify the hazardous area in your facility is one of the most important but least understood and neglected issues today. Why? Because the way in which you classify a hazardous area can significantly affect the operating costs of your facility in the long run.

Today's competitive chemicals business environment means that all efforts are made to keep costs on a tight leash.

Globally, in area classification, there are two major standards. One is the IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission) system, which is followed in Europe, Asia , Australia, Africa and many other regions. The second system is the NEC (National Electrical Code) which is popular in North America and parts of the middle east. The IEC system has three zones (Zones 0, 1 and 2) based on decreasing probability of explosive vapor or gas mixtures being present . On the other hand the NEC system has two levels (Division 1 and Division 2), again based on decreasing probability of hazardous mixtures of gas or vapor being present.

If your facility has been designed by an engineer who has wrongly "overclassified" the hazardous areas, then you are unnecessarily incurring additional costs without any benefits. What is overclassification? Simply, it is declaring an area as hazardous when it is really not. How does this increase costs? By forcing you to buy and maintain expensive explosion protected equipment when an ordinary weatherproof one would have been just as good. Secondly, since the area is anyway not hazardous, you are paying more for safety that you do not need. It is the equivalent of wearing a safety helmet while having lunch in your home.

Declaring an area as Zone 1, when instead it should really be Zone 2 is also a case of overclassification. This then restricts your ability to use some of the cost effective techniques like "Non incendive" which are available for use in Zone 2 only (but not allowed in Zone 1).

What is worse is that if your plant has large swathes of areas marked as "hazardous" then you may have a very difficult time with your local authorities, if you approach them for permissions for expansions, etc. These days they will always have the NIMBY syndrome (Not in my backyard ). This would be really tragic if the area does not deserve to be marked as hazardous, but it has been done by some overzealous engineer many years back.

What about underclassification? Underclassification is declaring an area as non-hazardous, which should in fact be marked as hazardous. This is possible due to ignorance or incompetence of the design engineer or perhaps the original design was modified by the owner/operators without considering reclassification. This is downright dangerous and is much more serious.

This is exactly what has happened in the case study video above.

How to resolve these problems?

How can this problem be resolved? By conducting an audit of your present facility, marking hazardous areas with reference to the current standards available, as well as training the personnel in the basics of area classification.

Everyone who works in hazardous areas, should know what is a "hazardous area". This simple logical fact is ignored by many plant managements, thinking that it is only the job of the Safety Manager. However this is not right, all personnel who actually work in a hazardous area should know what it means.

Some of the resistance of the management might be the fear that they will have to spare even more of their already shrinking pool of skilled workers for classroom training. However an effective alternative would be to impart training using modern methods such as e-learning.

It is ridiculuous to teach 21st century technology with 16th (?) century teaching methods (classrooms with a teacher and a blackboard). Use e-learning instead. Abhisam Software's e-learning course on Hazardous Area Instrumentation can be used to train engineers and technicians very effectively without them having to be away from work.

Maintenance in Hazardous area installations

This is an area which is ignored many times, either because of budget constraints or because of plain underestimation of risks related to poor maintenance. In "normal" areas, poor maintenance mayu only result in shutdowns and consequent loss of production. However in hazardous areas, poor maintenance can result in even disaster that may cost the company dear.

In many chemical facilities, this poor maintenance practices may be because of cost pressures related and reduced levels of "skilled" manpower, wholesale outsourcing of maintenance functions to "lowest cost" contractors who may not have adequately trained manpower, or simply because of downsizing of engineering departments in process industries ( the original engineers who had an idea of the design no longer remain and are replaced by newcomers who have little idea about the installation).

However, if one does a well scheduled maintenance and inspections with trained manpower, many problems can be detected which can be nipped in the bud. These may be many things like bolts missing on explosion proof boxes, or improper grounding of barriers. Or it may be that an instrument which is certified for use only in Zone 2 was installed in Zone 1 (because the technician who replaced it could not understand what those funny symbols and labels mean!)

If these kind of operations are tolerated, it can result in explosions and undesirable events. The cost of such an event is much more than the cost of preventive measures.

The cost of training employees should no longer be a constraint as an effective e-learning program can be very cost effective either as a basic training or as a refresher course. In fact the cost of training in this way will be miniscule, compared to the cost of ignorance, which could result in a major disaster.

If you would like to train your technical personnel in Hazardous Area Instrumentation, we have an excellent training course that can be downloaded to your PC immediately. The cost is a very affordable $ 150 US and if you wish to purchase multiple copies, please ask us for our discount coupon code.

Download Hazardous Area Instrumentation training course here.

In case of any questions please feel free to contact us.