Start up and shut down Incidents

According to the Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS), an industry-sponsored membership organization that identifies and addresses process safety needs within the chemical, pharmaceutical, and petroleum industries, the majority of process safety incidents occur during start-up even though these actions represent only a small portion of the operating life of a plant. The CCPS states that process safety incidents occur five times more often during start-up than during normal operations. Also, a 2010 study of incidents in the refining industry found that 50 percent of process safety incidents occur during start-ups, shutdowns, and other events that infrequently occur.

“This is because the startup and shutdown periods involve many non-routine procedures, and these periods can result in unexpected and unusual situations,” says the CSB.

Key Recommendations

• Communicate the essential elements of new operating procedures in writing.
• Communicate potential hazards and safe operating limits in writing.
• Provide training in new procedures commensurate with their complexity.
• Ensure the facility’s lockout/tagout program requires that equipment is rendered safe before opening for inspection or maintenance. Equipment opening procedures should contain a stop work provision that requires higher levels of management’s review and approval when safe opening conditions, such as equipment depressurization, cannot be verified.
• In complex and critical process systems, multichannel communication with feedback provides the best opportunity for operators to establish and maintain a mutual understanding of the process unit and its expected future state. During times of abnormal operating conditions, such as unit start-up, the risk of operators having dissimilar or incompatible understandings of the state of the process unit is even greater, making effective communication vital and feedback essential.
• Ensure that operators are supervised and supported by experienced, technically trained personnel during unit start-ups and shutdowns and that they are sufficiently trained on the control systems that they will be operating. Consideration should be given to the use of simulators for training operators in abnormal situations during start-ups and shutdowns.
• For high-hazard processes, establish a shiftwork policy to minimize the effects of fatigue. Individuals are poor self-assessors and are less likely to admit they are too fatigued to work safely.