Washington — Many chemical amenities “have not fully recognized that the effective remote isolation of equipment is critical to quickly stopping releases of hazardous materials” and defending staff, the Chemical Safety Board says.
It’s a key takeaway of a current CSB report that calls for improved remote isolation, which permits course of equipment to be shut off from a secure distance. The report stems from CSB evaluation of incidents involving an absence of such equipment, together with a deadly explosion and hearth in April 2019 on the KMCO manufacturing facility in Crosby, TX, and a November 2019 hearth and explosion on the TPC Group chemical plant in Port Neches, TX.
“It is critical that facilities in the United States that use or store large quantities of hazardous chemicals evaluate and improve upon their remote isolation capabilities,” the report states. “A key opportunity to evaluate remote isolation needs is during the process hazard analysis – a systematic review that is required by U.S. regulations to evaluate process hazards and their safeguards.”
CSB notes that equipment equivalent to valves can comprise or divert the discharge of hazardous supplies, serving to to curb chemical incidents and subsequent employee accidents.
Speaking throughout a July 25 public assembly, CSB member Catherine J.Okay. Sandoval stated the difficulty isn’t
an absence of know-how, however lack of its implementation.
“The technology exists in multiple ways to use remote isolation equipment and be able to incorporate it within existing systems so that when you get alarms, with the touch of a button, then you know a vessel can be turned off and you don’t have overpressurization or you don’t have to send out a person to turn off a valve,” she stated.
CSB recommends OSHA replace its commonplace on course of security administration to “include an evaluation of the need for remote isolation devices.” It additionally calls on the Environmental Protection Agency revise its Risk Management Program rule to require an identical analysis.
Additionally, CSB calls on the American Petroleum Institute to broaden business steerage paperwork on remote isolation equipment to amenities past refineries.
