Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Process Safety and Environmental Protection

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/psep

Developments in inherent safety: A review of the progress

during 2001–2011 and opportunities ahead

Rajagopalan Srinivasan a,b,∗ , Sathish Natarajan a

a Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engg, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent, Singapore, 119260,
Singapore
b Process Sciences and Modeling, Institute of Chemical and Engineering Science, 1 Pesek Road, Jurong Island, Singapore, 62783, Singapore

a b s t r a c t

This paper reviews the progress in inherent safety. A summary of the historical developments up to the year 2000 is
first presented which sets the stage for a review of the key developments during the first 11 years of the 21st century.
A landscape of inherent safety is developed by mapping publications on two coordinates. The first coordinate, the
risk coordinate, indicates if the focus of a paper relates to inherent hazard or to the likelihood of events. The second
coordinate, the management coordinate, focuses on the ways and means to understand and assess inherent safety.
Out of the 187 papers that have appeared over this 11-year period, 131 pertained to developments in inherently safer
design; these have been organized on the proposed landscape. The rest introduce the basic concepts of inherent
safety and address its incorporation into regulation, education and accident investigation. These along with the
application of inherent safety in industry are also discussed. We conclude with a discussion on recent trends in
industry and suggest directions for future research.
© 2012 The Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Principles; Metrics; Risk management; Human factors; Education; Sustainability

1. Introduction
“What you don’t have can’t leak”, said Trevor Kletz (Kletz, 1978)
and laid the foundation of a new approach for risk manage-
ment in chemical processes. Since then, the concept called
inherent safety has been the subject of much attention, with
an explosion of ideas, methods, and examples as described
in several books and publications (Bollinger and Crowl, 1996;
CCPS, 2009; Kletz, 1998). It is now also incorporated into safety
regulations (McKeon-Slattery, 2010; Sawyer, 2010). The key
principles of inherent safety are now well described. This
paper seeks to review the major developments over the last
11 years and suggest some topics requiring further attention.
This review of inherent safety is organized around process
risk management. The risks involved in chemical processes
are discussed next. The evolution of inherent safety in the
20th century is summarized in Section 2. Next, in Section 3
we describe a risk management based framework for analyz-
ing inherent safety. We use this framework for reviewing the
inherent safety literature over the first 11 years of the 21st
century. We conclude with a discussion of recent trends and
suggest directions for future research.
1.1. Risks in chemical processes
Any accident in a chemical process is a product of three fac-
tors – an inherent hazard in the technology for converting
raw materials to products, one or more events that instan-
tiate a failure mode which leads to the undesired outcome. A
hazard is a condition or practice that has the potential to
cause harm, including human injury, damage to property,
damage to the environment, or some combination of these
(Sutton, 2010). The keyword in the definition is ‘potential’.
Hazards exist in all human activities but rarely result in an
incident. An event defined as any occurrence in the process,
such as an error, caused by equipment performance or human
action or an occurrence external to the process (e.g. tsunami,
earthquake, etc.) is necessary to translate a hazard into an

∗
Corresponding author at: Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engg, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent,
Singapore, 119260, Singapore. Tel.: +65 65168041.
E-mail address: chergs@nus.edu.sg (R. Srinivasan).
Received 12 March 2012; Received in revised form 15 May 2012; Accepted 14 June 2012
0957-5820/$ – see front matter © 2012 The Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.psep.2012.06.001
390 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403
accident. The first event in an accident sequence is called
the initiating event. Examples include equipment or software
failures, human errors, etc. A series of events link an initiat-
ing event to the outcome. These intermediate events could be
responses from engineered safety features and administra-
tive controls to an initiating event or knock on effects such as
secondary explosions. It is important to view an accident as
a discrete sequence of events because each individual event
represents an opportunity to terminate the accident sequence.
The likelihood of each event is a measure of the probability or
frequency of its occurrence. The undesired outcome is an uncon-
trolled release of material or energy that results in damage
to humans, the plant and the environment. Fire, explosion,
and release of toxic chemicals are common examples of out-
comes in the refining and petrochemical industries (Marsh,
2001).
Consider the accident in the BP Texas City refinery (CSB,
2007). The outcome of the accident were two explosions that
resulted in 15 deaths, injury to 180 others, and losses of about
$1.5 billion. The hazard in this case was the presence of a large
amount of flammable material in the isomerization tower.
During startup, operations personnel pumped flammable liq-
uid hydrocarbon into the isomerization tower for over 3 h
without removing any liquid out. This is the initiating event
in this accident. Critical alarms and control instrumentation
failed to alert the operator of the high level in the tower. Con-
sequently, unknown to the operators liquid overflowed from
the top of tower and formed a flammable vapor cloud. The
failure of the instruments and mistakes from operators were
the intermediate events in this accident. The flammable vapor
cloud was ignited by backfire from an idling truck that resulted
in two explosions.
Risk management is the term given to the collective efforts
to manage risks in order to prevent accidents. Risk is defined
formally as the probability that an exposure to a hazard would
lead to an undesired outcome. Risk management involves a
variety of techniques to (a) minimize the hazards, (b) decrease
the likelihood of events, and (c) minimize the severity of the
undesired outcome. Hazards can be eliminated or minimized
by choosing less hazardous materials, benign reaction chem-
istry and forgiving process design. The likelihood of an event
can be decreased by providing layers of protection using safety
devices or work processes. The severity of the outcome can be
minimized using operating procedures, training, emergency
response, etc.
Different risk management strategies are suitable in differ-
ent stages of the plant lifecycle. The lifecycle of a chemical
plant can be divided into the following stages (CCPS, 2009):
research, process development, detailed design, operations,
maintenance and modifications and finally decommission-
ing. During the research stage, process chemists choose the
raw materials, intermediates, synthesis routes and specify the
basic operating parameters for producing the product. In the
process development stage, process engineers use the infor-
mation provided by chemists to design unit operations in
which necessary chemical transformations are realized. The
process flowsheet is also developed at this stage. During the
detailed design stage, process engineers develop P&IDs, lay-
out of the plant and specify the operating procedures to be
followed for startup, shutdown, etc. Meanwhile, control engi-
neers design the control system along with suitable safety
instrumented systems (SIS). In the operations stage, the oper-
ating procedures are created or updated based on experience
and retrofits to the plant.
Until the mid-20th century, risk management in chemical
plants was performed only after the detailed design of the
plant had been established, by which time it is too late to
make changes to the process technology (materials, reactions,
unit operations, etc.), the key determinants of overall risk.
Moreover, risk management primarily focused on reducing the
likelihood of events by providing layers of protection.
2. The early years of inherent safety:
principles and metrics
On December 14, 1977, inspired by the Flixborough disaster,
Dr. Trevor Kletz, presented the Annual Jubilee Lecture to the
Society of Chemical Industry in Widnes, England. His lec-
ture titled “What You Don’t Have, Can’t Leak” was the first
clear and concise discussion of the concept of inherently safer
design in chemical processes. Kletz proposed to change or
alter the process to either eliminate the hazard completely or
sufficiently reduce its magnitude or likelihood of occurrence,
rather than controlling them. He argued that the greatest
potential opportunities for impacting the risk profile occur
early during process design as there is a great deal of freedom
in the selection of chemistry, solvents, raw materials, interme-
diates, unit operations, plant location and process parameters.
For instance, during the research stage significant reduc-
tion in risk can be achieved using benign raw materials and
reaction chemistry, thereby eliminating hazards inherent in
the process. Risk reduction during the process development
stage can be achieved by using forgiving or robust unit opera-
tions. In the detailed design stage, opportunities to eliminate
the hazards are minimal. But likelihood of events can be min-
imized using layers of protection. Risk reduction during the
operation stage can be achieved using administrative controls,
emergency planning, evacuation procedures, etc. to reduce the
severity of an undesired outcome. The effectiveness of the
various risk reduction strategies in the different stages of the
process is shown in Fig. 1. Kletz enumerated certain princi-
ples that can be followed to design inherently safer processes,
key among which are minimize, substitute, moderate and simplify
(Kletz, 1985).
Minimize, also called intensification, means to reduce the
quantity of material or energy contained in a manufactur-
ing process or plant. Substitute, as the name implies, means
to replace a hazardous material or process with an alterna-
tive that eliminate or reduces the hazard. Examples include
solvents, materials of construction and heat transfer media.
Moderate, also called attenuate, means using materials under
less hazardous conditions. Moderation of conditions can be
accomplished by strategies that are either physical (i.e., lower
temperatures) or chemical (i.e., development of a reaction
chemistry which operates at less severe conditions). Simplify,
as the word suggests, is to design the process to elimi-
nate unnecessary complexity making it robust and forgiving,
thereby reducing the opportunities for error and wrong opera-
tion. While the above four strategies are the major ones, others
such as Limitation of effects, Avoiding incorrect assembly and Mak-
ing status clear were also proposed (Kletz, 1998). It is often
argued that these are sub-categories of the main principles
described above.
Application of inherent safety principles helps gener-
ate modified process designs. However, design modifications
rarely result in a monotonic reduction of risk. Design options
with alternate chemistries, materials and unit operations will
 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403
Hazard
elimination or
reduction
Effectiveness of risk
reduction
Research
Process
Development
Fig. 1 – Effectiveness of various risk reduction strategies across process lifecycle.
likely pose different hazards, as well as different degrees of
the same hazard. For example, consider substitution of a toxic
but non-volatile solvent with a non-toxic but volatile one. The
risks in handling the solvent are eliminated by replacing the
toxic solvent. But the new volatile solvent could cause high
pressures in the reactor and the potential for the reaction to
have a runaway is greater. Hence, it was recognized during
the mid-1990s that some form of quantification was necessary
to evaluate the trade-offs among various design options. This
led to the development of metrics for measuring the inherent
safeness of design options.
Edwards and co-workers (Edwards and Lawrence, 1993;
Lawrence, 1996) proposed the Prototype Index for Inherent Safety
(PIIS) primarily for use in the research and process develop-
ment (route selection) stages of design. Their index considers
reaction conditions and material properties through seven
parameters of the process route – inventory, temperature,
pressure, yield, toxicity, flammability, and explosiveness. The
first four parameters are considered to reflect the ‘process’
and the last three the ‘chemical’. The total range for each of
these parameters was divided into 10 sub-ranges and numer-
ical scores assigned for each of these sub-ranges. The score
of the worst chemical in terms of flammability, toxicity, and
explosiveness was chosen for each route and added together
to form its ‘chemical score’. Similarly, the scores for pressure,
temperature and yield were combined as the ‘process score’.
These two scores were added together to derive a score for
each route. The route with the highest numerical value was
considered to be the worst route. PIIS primarily focusses on
the risks posed by materials and reactions. Hurme and co-
workers (Heikkila, 1999; Heikkila et al., 1996) extended the PIIS
to consider a wider range of factors including layout, type
of equipment, process structures, side reactions and other
chemical interactions. Their index, called the inherent safety
index (ISI), is therefore applicable during detailed design (flow-
sheet development) stage as well. The Dow Fire & Explosion
(F&EI) index is widely used for evaluating the hazard cate-
gory of a process plant (Dow, 1994). Kletz (1998) suggested
that the F&EI can also be used for inherent safety assess-
ment.
391
Safety systems
Procedures
Operations,
Detailed design maintenance and
modifications
During 1990s, inherent safety also started receiving some
attention from both industry and regulatory organizations,
especially in the United States and Europe (Ashford, 1993).
A survey across the European process and chemical sector
in the early 1990s revealed that the awareness of these con-
cepts and the benefits they offered was primarily restricted
to safety specialists. As a result, few organizations actually
recognized, promoted, or used the concept in process develop-
ment and design. Good examples of inherently safer processes
had generally risen from economic pressures or as a result
of accidents or near-misses in the past, rather than a sys-
tematic application of the inherent safety principles (Schabel,
1997). Hence, the Inherent SHE in Design (INSIDE) project was
established in 1994 to promote inherently safer chemical pro-
cesses. The result of this project was a collection of tools and
methods, called the INSET toolkit, to assist process designers
incorporate inherent safety principles during chemistry route
selection, route evaluation, process design optimization and
plant design (Mansfield, 1997; Schabel, 1997). As the decade
progressed, companies such as Bayer (Falke and Kuschnerus,
1994), Dow (Scheffler, 1996), and Exxon Chemicals (French
et al., 1996) recognized the importance of inherent safety and
developed internal standards for their use within their safety
management program. Against this backdrop, the develop-
ments in the field of inherent safety in the 21st century are
reviewed next.
3. Developments in inherent safety during
2001–2011
A survey of the literature in the 21st century was conducted,
aimed at understanding the issues, concepts, methodologies,
and applications receiving attention under the broad moniker
of inherent safety. The survey involved a search for the terms
‘Inherent Safety’ or ‘Inherently Safe’ in the title, abstract or
keywords of publications in the Scopus database appearing
from 2001 to 2011. Inherent safety, as a concept, has broad cur-
rency today ranging from agricultural and biological sciences,
medicine, and nuclear industry. This review focuses primar-
ily on the chemical process industry; hence the search was
392 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403

Table 1 – Journals that publish developments in inherent

safety. Material

Name of Journal Number of

publications
Journal of Loss Prevention in Process Industries
Process Safety Progress
Process Safety and Environmental Protection
Journal of Hazardous Materials
Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research
Chemical & Engineering News
Chemical Engineering Progress
Chemical Engineering Science
Institution of Chemical Engineers Symposium
Series
Chemical Engineering Transactions
Organic Process Research & Development
AIChE Journal
Computers & Chemical Engineering
Others
Total
further restricted to the field of chemical engineering, chem-
istry, and environmental science. Where multiple versions
(for example, conference proceedings and journal) of a paper
appeared, we only consider the extended version of the paper.
Conference papers for which only the abstract was available
were also ignored. This resulted in a total of 187 papers.
Table 1 lists the sources of these publications. The distri-
bution of the papers across the timeline is shown in Fig. 2 and
points to a healthy and continued interest. These papers cover
a broad theme, ranging from fundamentals and applications,
to regulations, accident investigation and education. 27 papers
(14%) introduce the concepts and explain the principles of
inherent safety in general (Hansson, 2010; Hendershot, 2006,
2010). These are not covered in detail in this review. Another 29
papers (16%) cover aspects such as inherent safety regulations,
education and its use in performing accident investigation.
These are discussed in Section 4. Here, we review the advances
in the design of inherently safer processes as reported in 131
papers.
We mapped the landscape of developments in inherent
safety by analyzing these papers based on two coordinates.
The developments in inherent safety can be analyzed by
taking a risk management view. As discussed in Section 1,
risk management involves (a) elimination or minimization of
inherent hazards in the process, (b) reduction of the likelihood
of events and (c) minimization of the severity of the undesired
30
25
Chemistry
31
24
23
Hazard Unit operaon
15
10
9
Flowsheet &
6
Layout design
6
4
Inherent safety
Storage &
4 Transportaon
4
3
Process control &
3 Safety systems
45
Likelihood
187 Human factors &
Management
Systems
Fig. 3 – Taxonomy of risk coordinate.
outcomes. Inherently safer strategies can be applied toward the
elimination of the hazard, referred to as the first order view
or for its minimization, referred to as second order view (CCPS,
2009). Hence, the first coordinate, the risk coordinate, indicates
if the focus relates to the inherent hazard or to the likelihood
of events. A taxonomy of this coordinate is shown in Fig. 3.
The inherent hazards in a process could arise from: materials
used, chemistry of the process, unit operation design, flowsheet
and layout design, storage and transportation, or operating regimes.
Inherently safer strategies can also be applied to the design
of layers of protection to reduce the likelihood of events. This
includes robust or reliable designs of process control and safety
instrumented systems and simpler, procedures that are easier
to understand and execute, with proper training, safety cul-
ture, and management systems that minimize human factors
(Sawyer, 2010).
The second coordinate focuses on the ways and means
to understand and assess inherent safety. A taxonomy of
this management coordinate is shown in Fig. 4. In this man-
agement coordinate, we mark the nature of the reported
development as applicable to fundamental aspects of haz-
ards, illustrative applications in industry, safety systems or
human factors; and methods to assess inherent safety of
design options. Approaches to assess inherent safety include
models, qualitative reviews and quantitative metrics. Models,
either experimental or computational, provide information
for performing inherent safety assessment in the form of

20
Inherent
safety
15

Praccal
Fundamentals Assessment
10 applicaons

Qualitave
0 Metrics Models
reviews
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

Fig. 2 – Distribution of papers over the years. Fig. 4 – Taxonomy of the management coordinate.
 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403
Storage &
Transportaon
7%
Material
29%
Flowsheet &
Layout design
28%
Unit Operaons Chemistry
14% 22%
Fig. 5 – Distribution of publications based on hazard
addressed.
properties of materials, behavior of unit operations, etc.
Qualitative reviews are techniques that use guidewords, brain-
storming, HAZOP, checklist, etc. for hazard evaluation. Metrics
are used to quantify the hazards associated with a particular
process. Each paper was categorized based on both the coor-
dinates. For instance, the paper by Liaw et al. (2008) discusses
the determination of flash point of materials by using quan-
titative simulations. This paper was hence classified under
material in the risk coordinate and under model in the manage-
ment coordinate. Papers with significant coverage of multiple
topics were classified under all the respective categories. For
example, Palaniappan et al. (2002a), study the material and
chemistry hazards of process options using a metric. Hence
this paper was classified under both material and chemistry
in the risk coordinate and under metric in the management
coordinate.
Hazards received the most attention with 87% of the
papers. The distribution of papers across the hazards is shown
in Fig. 5. We only describe illustrative publications that reveal
the key trends rather than all the papers that have appeared
on the topic.
3.1. Material
Materials used in the process have certain intrinsic char-
acteristics such as flammability, toxicity and explosiveness.
Knowledge of these allow for substitution of hazardous
materials with less hazardous ones or to provide sufficient
protection. For commonly used materials, these properties
are available in material safety data sheets (MSDS). In the
early part of the new millennium, these properties from MSDS
were used to quantify the inherent hazards. But properties
reported in the MSDS are obtained using standardized tests
under predefined conditions. The actual conditions in which
a material is used can be significantly different, which would
influence its properties. Moreover, the properties of mixtures
are not readily available. Hence, in the last few years, the
focus has shifted to predicting properties of materials and
mixtures under process conditions. The prediction of flash
point of substances, which serves as a simple measure of
flammability, has received particular attention. Chen (2004)
studied the effect of an inerting component, in particular,
water during cyclohexane oxidation, to moderate the flamma-
bility of the mixture. Liaw et al. (2008) use flash point analyzers
393
with standardized test protocols (ASTM 93B) to experimen-
tally determine the flash point of partially miscible mixtures
of flammable solvents. They also developed a mathematical
model using these experimentally determined values. But,
experimental determination of the flash point is expensive,
tedious, time-consuming, and sometimes even impossible.
Therefore, simulations using quantitative structure property-
activity relationships (QSPR/QSAR) to predict the flash point
are gaining popularity. Patel et al. (2010) proposed a molecular
simulation based technique for predicting the flash point of
solvents. They studied the acetic acid–water separation pro-
cess where ethyl acetate is normally used as the solvent. Using
computer-aided molecular design, they identified three other
solvents with lower flammability that are inherently safer.
Unlike flammability, toxicity is a more complex property
of a material. The effect can be acute or chronic, affecting
humans or other living organisms either through contact or
ingestion. Usually the various factors of toxicity are lumped
into a single value (LC50 or LD50). Cordella et al. (2009) pro-
posed a new approach to screen the toxic profile of unwanted
materials formed as a result of process deviations due to loss
of control. They took into account acute and long-term hazard
for humans, damage to ecosystems and environmental media
contamination by unwanted materials.
Understanding the explosiveness of materials, particularly
of dusts, has also received attention recently. Eckhoff (2009b)
describes the role of powder science in dust explosiveness
and Amyotte and Eckhoff (2010) provide a general overview of
the mechanisms by which dust explosions originate, and the
methodologies by which they can be prevented. Di Benedetto
et al. (2010) report on the effect of that particle sizes have on
dust explosiveness, represented as a dust explosion regime
diagram. Amyotte et al. (2010) also quantify the effects of
dust particle size and flammable gas admixture on the explo-
siveness of dusts. Amyotte et al. (2009) explicitly link the
inherent safety principles of minimize, substitute, moderate
and simplify to strategies for dust explosion prevention and
mitigation.
In summary, the estimation of material properties, espe-
cially flammability and explosiveness, has received significant
attention in the last 10 years. This knowledge can aid chemists
and engineers in understanding the inherent hazards in a pro-
cess and subsequently choose benign materials. Table 2 lists
all the papers under the material coordinate.
3.2. Chemistry
The materials used in the process undergo chemical trans-
formations to form the final product. Chemical Reactivity in
terms of exothermicity and the potential for runaway pose
significant hazards if not properly understood and controlled.
It is therefore imperative to develop methods capable of pre-
dicting the onset of runaways. Hydrogen peroxide, one of most
powerful oxidizers known, plays an important role in industry.
Hence the study of runways during peroxide decomposition
has received attention. Papadaki et al. (2005) developed a
model using the kinetics of hydrogen peroxide decomposition
to study the potential for runaways based on peroxide initial
concentration, initial temperature, amount of catalyst, and so
on. Unlike hydrogen peroxide, the kinetics of decomposition of
organic peroxides vary significantly depending on the organic
groups present. Hence, Lu et al. (2011) used QSPR to predict
the onset temperature and heat of decomposition of organic
peroxides to determine thermal stability. In general, the
394 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403

Table 2 – Classification of papers discussing material Table 3 – Classification of papers addressing chemistry
hazards. hazards.
Paper Management Paper Management
coordinate coordinate

Eckhoff (2009b) Hassim and Edwards (2006)

Fundamentals
Eckhoff (2009a) Palaniappan et al. (2002a)
Koller et al. (2001)
Hassim and Hurme (2010c)
Leong and Shariff (2009)
Cordella et al. (2009)
Abedi and Shahriari (2005) Metric
Hassim and Edwards (2006)
Khan and Amyotte (2004)
Palaniappan et al. (2002a)
Gentile et al. (2003)
Koller et al. (2001)
Khan et al. (2003)
Leong and Shariff (2009)
Shah et al. (2003)
Abedi and Shahriari (2005) Metric
Khan and Amyotte (2004) Chou et al. (2011)
Gentile et al. (2003) Wu et al. (2011)
Khan et al. (2003) Lin et al. (2010)
Shah et al. (2003) Lu et al. (2010)
Srinivasan and Nhan (2008) Patel et al. (2010)
Tugnoli et al. (2009) Schweitzer et al. (2010)
Lin and Shu (2009)
Di Benedetto et al. (2010)
You et al. (2009)
Liaw et al. (2010a)
Cheng et al. (2008)
Liaw et al. (2010b)
Dermaut et al. (2007) Model
Chang et al. (2009)
Papadaki et al. (2005)
Chang et al. (2008)
Westerterp and Molga (2004)
Liaw et al. (2008)
Bruggink et al. (2003)
Liaw et al. (2008)
Maestri and Rota (2007)
Dahl et al. (2007)
Molga et al. (2007)
Stolte et al. (2007)
Yuan et al. (2009)
Chen (2004)
Lu et al. (2011)
Arai (2003)
Model Shah et al. (2005)
Palaniappan et al. (2002c)
Palaniappan et al. (2004)
Myers (2008)
Amyotte et al. (2003) Zwetsloot and Ashford (2003) Practical application
Lu et al. (2011)
García-Serna et al. (2007)
Shah et al. (2005) Qualitative
Carpenter and Ogle (2003)
Palaniappan et al. (2004) review
Gupta and Edwards (2003)
Mohd Shariff et al. (2006)
Eckhoff (2005)
Abuswer et al. (2011)
Amyotte et al. (2007) summary, the focus has been on prediction of reactivity haz-
Amyotte et al. (2010) ards, particularly the onset of runaways (Table 3).

Koban and Herrmann (2011)

Practical application 3.3. Unit operation
Zwetsloot and Ashford (2003)

Limbach et al. (2009)

Gupta and Edwards (2003)
Qualitative
review
Amyotte et al. (2009)
methods to determine the boundaries of runaway reactions
consist of: safety boundary diagrams and parametric sensitiv-
ity. The safety boundary diagram is a plot of two dimensionless
numbers, the reactivity number and the exothermicity num-
ber. Regions with low exothermicity are inherently safe as
the potential for runaway is low. Westerterp and Molga (2004)
describe methods to develop safety boundary diagrams for
single and multiple reactions both in homogeneous and het-
erogeneous systems and discuss the inherently safer reaction
conditions in continuous and dispersed phases. Parametric
sensitivity refers to the study of the effect that changes in a
parameter has on the variables in the process. A high sen-
sitivity indicates that a small change in an input parameter
results in a large change in the process variable like tempera-
ture. Schweitzer et al. (2010) developed a dynamic model of the
hydrotreatment of gasoils to quantify the effect that variation
in heat transfer coefficient has on the stability of the reactive
system. Effects of other parameters such as feed composi-
tion and reactant flow rates could also be similarly studied. In
The design of unit operations in which the chemical or
physical transformations are realized also provides opportuni-
ties for hazard reduction. Different types of equipment have
different inherently safer characteristics, such as inventory,
operating techniques and self-regulation. One approach to
decrease the inventory is to decrease the size of the unit oper-
ation and at the same time increase efficiency. This can be
achieved using microreactors or novel multifunctional reac-
tors such as heat integrated or reactive separation units.
Microreactor systems are inherently safer because of lower
inventory levels. Other advantages include increased mass
and heat transfer capabilities, flow uniformity and poten-
tial for high throughput. They ensure a smaller plant size,
lower cost of production, and more flexible response to mar-
ket demand. Kestenbaum et al. (2002) designed and built a
microreactor system for ethylene oxide synthesis and demon-
strated comparable performance to an industrial process, with
the added advantage of improved safety. Microreactors are
particularly useful for fine chemicals production. With con-
trolled residence times and temperatures, the desired product
can be generated without unwanted byproducts or side reac-
tions, resulting in higher selectivity and yield. Numerous
reactions for fine chemicals productions have been reported
 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403
Table 4 – Classification of papers addressing unit
operation hazards.
Paper Management
coordinate
Tugnoli et al. (2009) Metric
Amyotte et al. (2007)
Koc et al. (2011)
Liebner et al. (2011)
Klais et al. (2009)
Liu et al. (2009) Model
Benaïssa et al. (2008)
Steyer et al. (2008)
Kestenbaum et al. (2002)
Ebrahimi et al. (2009)
Zwetsloot and Ashford (2003)
D’Aquino and Mavridis (2007)
Thayer (2005) Practical application
Rogers and Hermann (2004)
Lopez et al. (2005)
Amyotte et al. (2009)
Chiappetta et al. (2006) Qualitative
Rusli and Mohd Shariff (2010) review
Khan and Amyotte (2002)
in microreactors (Thayer, 2005). Novel designs of more con-
ventional reactor systems have also received attention in
the new millennium. For instance, Li et al. (2009) designed
a spray reactor for p-xylene oxidation to terephthalic acid.
They showed that compared to conventional process for
terephthalic acid, the spray process minimizes acetic acid oxi-
dation which improves safety. Similarly, Subramaniam (2010)
proposed a one-step spray reactor for inherently safer produc-
tion of polymer grade terephthalic acid. Reactive distillation
designs reduce the number of pieces of equipment required
thus making it inherently safer. Steyer et al. (2008) propose a
new cyclohexene to cyclohexonol reactive distillation design
for improving safety and efficiency compared to the conven-
tional process. Benaïssa et al. (2008) proposed an intensified
heat exchanger/reactor for the esterification process. Koc et al.
(2011) developed a dynamic model of a catalytic water-gas-
shift membrane reactor to determine the dynamic behavior
of the system at various operating conditions. They evalu-
ated the effect that variations in feed temperature, flow rate,
catalyst loading and purity of feed had on the process in the
form of possibly adverse deviations. Eckhoff (2009a) provides
example of inherently safer design options of dust handling
equipment using mass flow silos and hoppers. In summary,
the focus in unit operation has been on designing novel reactor
systems such as micro-reactors and reactive-distillation units.
Table 4 lists all the papers classified under the unit operation
coordinate.
3.4. Flowsheet and layout
The flowsheet and layout design of the plant also offer oppor-
tunities for minimizing hazards. Falcke et al. (2011) studied
the integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) process for
power generation and found that this process has poorer
inherent safety characteristics as compared to the conven-
tional process since the gasifier unit and gas turbine in the
IGCC process had high F&EI values and the presence of large
quantities of CO posed toxicity hazards. Tugnoli et al. (2011)
defined key performance indicators to study multiple impacts
(environment, safety, costs, health, etc.) during the flowsheet
395
design stage. Fluctuations occur in market demands for vari-
ous products. Process scheduling is used to adjust to the type
and quantity of products based on market conditions. For
instance, oil refineries continuously adjust the product slate to
account for seasonal changes in product demand (e.g., gaso-
line, diesel, heating oils, etc.). Hence it is beneficial to include
process scheduling expectations during design. Al-Mutairi
et al. (2008) presented a method for including scheduling
expectations during design and retrofitting. They use the Dow
F&EI as a safety metric to evaluate the NOx removal options
in a refinery, accounting for various crude grades and mode of
operation.
The length of piping carrying hazardous materials can be
minimized by suitable layout design. On the other hand, suffi-
cient separation distance between unit operations should also
be provided to ensure that a problem in one section of the plant
does not propagate to other sections, i.e. to prevent domino
events. A domino event (also known in the literature as esca-
lation or knock-on event) is an accident in which a primary
incident propagates to nearby equipment, triggering one or
more secondary incidents. Hence a trade-off between piping
length and prevention of domino events is necessary. Khan
et al. (2002) present the various inherently safer layout con-
siderations available for offshore oil and gas installations. For
example, the distance between gas compression and sepa-
ration facilities which operate at very high pressures should
be maximized. BP uses inherently safer design principles
for the layout of hydrocarbon systems on offshore facilities
(Considine et al., 2010). Cozzani et al. (2007) applied the inher-
ent safety principles, qualitatively, to determine effective ways
to prevent domino events. The ‘moderate’ principle was found
to be the most effective and simple rules-of-thumbs were
proposed for preliminary assessment of safety distances and
critical inventories. Fragment projection is among the most
frequent causes of domino events in industrial accidents. The
fragments become airborne and act as missiles. Pula et al.
(2007) developed a model to quantify the probability of mis-
sile impact on a particular equipment for missiles originating
from bursting of a vessel. These probability measures can help
in selection of safe separation distances. The study of domino
accidents and inherently safer layout of chemical plants is
rather recent, predominantly in the last five years. Table 5
lists all the papers classified under flowsheet and layout design
coordinate.
3.5. Storage and transportation
The inventory of hazardous materials stored in a plant poses
serious hazards which should be minimized. Reisch (2009)
proposed an inherently safer water purification system by
transporting sodium hypochlorite bleach instead of chlorine.
Landucci et al. (2008) proposed storage of hydrogen in the form
of metal hydrides, thus making it inherently safer. Hendershot
et al. (2006) reports on the modifications made to a bromine
raw material handling facility in which existing bulk storage
tanks were replaced by cylindrical vessels. Table 6 lists all the
papers under the storage and transportation coordinate.
3.6. Process control and safety system
Inherent safety principles can also be applied to the design of
layers of protection in order to reduce the likelihood of events.
Process control and safety instrumented systems are provided
in almost every chemical plant today. The design logic of the
396 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403

interact with the dynamics of the process and result in larger

Table 5 – Classification of papers discussing flowsheet
and layout hazards. than expected disturbances (Luyben and Hendershot, 2004).
Chemical processes constitute strongly nonlinear systems
Paper Management
with multiple steady-state solutions. Controllability analy-
coordinate
sis can offer insights for identifying the inherent properties
Clark (2008) Fundamentals, practical application of a process and how they limit control performance. Wang
Tugnoli et al. (2011) et al. (2011) argue that the different operating conditions of
Hassim and Hurme (2010b) the chemical plants have different stability and controllability
Hassim and Hurme (2010d) characteristics which should be studied first prior to con-
Khan and Amyotte (2005) trol system design. For example, the liquid phase catalytic
Rahman et al. (2005)
oxidation of toluene for producing benzoic acid is strongly
Koller et al. (2001)
exothermic, highly nonlinear and exhibits poor controllabil-
Leong and Shariff (2009)
Abedi and Shahriari (2005) ity characteristics. Yuan et al. (2011) explore the open and
Metric closed-loop controllability of this process and identify various
Khan and Amyotte (2004)
Gentile et al. (2003) sub-regions with different controllability characteristics to aid
Khan et al. (2003) in control system design.
Shah et al. (2003) Usually, chemical plants are also designed with additional
Hassim and Hurme (2010a)
layers of protection apart from the basic process control sys-
Tugnoli et al. (2010)
Tugnoli et al. (2008b)
tem. The protection layers can be composed of prevention
Tugnoli et al. (2007) devices such as pressure safety valves (PSV), safety instru-
mented systems (SIS), fire and gas systems (F&G) and other
Li et al. (2011) Metric,
emergency systems. A safety instrumented system (SIS) is a
Palaniappan et al. (2002b) model
protection layer, which shuts down the plant, or a part of it,
Banimostafa et al. (2011)
when a pre-specified condition occurs. The essential charac-
Falcke et al. (2011)
teristic of SIS is that it is composed of instruments, which
Shariff and Zaini (2010)
Takriff and Bahnuddin (2010) detect that process variables are exceeding pre-set limits, a
Shah et al. (2009) logic solver that processes this information and makes deci-
Shariff and Leong (2009) sions, and final control elements that take necessary action on
Leong and Shariff (2008) the process to achieve a safe state (Mannan and Lees, 2005).
Model
Moradi and Bahri (2008) Inherently safer SIS should be fully independent of the process
Al-Mutairi et al. (2008)
control system. Common-mode failure can result if the basic
Shah et al. (2005)
process control system and SIS share components, includ-
Palaniappan et al. (2004)
Ebrahimi et al. (2009) ing power supplies. The safety integrity level (SIL), defined as
Huser et al. (2009) the relative level of risk reduction provided by a safety func-
Pula et al. (2007) tion, is commonly used to classify the design criteria for PSV.
Study (2007) On the contrary, specific risk reduction requirement for the
Zwetsloot and Ashford (2003) Practical application SIS, F&G and other emergency systems are usually not spec-
Lopez et al. (2005) ified and standardized methods to quantify its risk reduction
Rusli and Mohd Shariff (2010)
level are lacking. Hence, Tanabe and Miyake (2011) proposed a
Qualitative methodology to apply the SIL concept to emergency systems
Cozzani et al. (2007)
review
Khan and Amyotte (2002) in order to provide risk reduction criteria and establish the
design requirements for these. Meel and Seider (2008) estimate
Tugnoli et al. (2008a) Qualitative review, metric
the frequencies of occurrence of abnormal events and failure
probabilities of safety systems. A review of passive and active
basic process control system can be used to make it inherently engineered systems that prevent dust explosions is reported
safer. For instance, when a disturbance occurs the control sys- by Pekalski et al. (2005) and Amyotte et al. (2010). Table 7 lists
tem design can allow for adequate time for controls to function the papers classified under the process control and safety system
before operating limits are reached. Process control systems coordinate.
are sometimes affected by process intensification, which
3.7. Human factors and management systems

Table 6 – Classification of papers discussing storage and

Human factors and management systems also play a signif-
transportation.
icant role in reducing the likelihood of events. Plant upsets
Paper Management coordinate
and accidents often involve some sort of human error (Sutton,
Nair (2009) Fundamentals 2010). These include failure to follow procedures, taking a
shortcut, or making an (incorrect) assumption about the valid-
Landucci et al. (2008)
Suardin et al. (2007) Model ity of an instrument reading. Errors of intent occur when
Etowa et al. (2002) supervision or management knowingly decide to over-ride
the normal operating or safety procedures. Human–human
Boeh and Christy (2011)
Johnson (2011) interaction and human–machine interaction influence the
Practical application
Reisch (2009) likelihood of events. Hendershot (2007) argues that the proper
Hendershot et al. (2006) documentation of the design basis could help in avoiding
Sharratt et al. (2003) Qualitative review
human error. Particularly, why a design option was chosen
must be well documented in addition to what is the design.
 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403 397

Table 7 – Classification of papers discussing process Table 9 – Citation counts for some inherent safety
control, safety systems and human factors. indices.
Paper Management Metric Citations
coordinate
PIIS (Edwards and Lawrence, 1993) 70
Luyben and Hendershot (2004) ISI (Heikkila, 1999; Heikkila et al., 1996) 85
Murphy (2011) Fundamentals i-Safe (Palaniappan et al., 2002a,b) 53
Pekalski et al. (2005) I2SI (Khan and Amyotte, 2004) 52

Meel and Seider (2008)

Abuswer et al. (2011) discussed here. Palaniappan et al. (2002a,b) developed expan-
Wang et al. (2009)
sions over the PIIS and ISI indices. They added five other
Wang et al. (2011)
Yuan et al. (2011)
supplementary indices: Hazardous Chemical Index (HCI), Haz-
Model ardous Reaction Index (HRI), Total Chemical Index (TCI), Worst
Meel et al. (2006)
Rathnayaka et al. (2011) Chemical Index (WCI) and Worst Reaction Index (WRI) and
First (2010) hazards due to Chemical Reactivity. The benefits of the supple-
Meel and Seider (2006) mentary indices accrue in situations where PIIS or ISI indices
Meel and Seider (2008)
of competing routes are close to one another and cannot
Hendershot (2011) adequately differentiate between them. Usually indices treat
Summers and Zachary (2008) Practical application the chemicals in the process system as individual compo-
Leffler (2007) nents and not as a mixture. Hence Leong and Shariff (2009)
Dowell (2001) Qualitative proposed a new index called process route index (PRI) that
Bennett (2006) review accounts for mixture properties. Metrics to assess the impacts
Tanabe and Miyake (2011) Qualitative review, Model on health and the environment have also been proposed in
recent years. Hassim and Hurme (2010c) developed an index
called the Inherent Occupational Health Index for evaluat-
This would enable the operators to understand the rationale
ing health hazards in the research stage of the plant lifecycle
for a particular procedure. Without proper documentation,
based on material properties. Subsequently, they also pro-
inherently safer designs are vulnerable to modifications that
posed indices for the flowsheet development stage (Health
reduce their efficacy. Ergonomics should be applied in the lay-
Quotient Index) and the engineering design stage (Occupa-
out of equipment, valves, controls, and anything else that
tional Health Index) for assessing occupational health (Hassim
operating and maintenance personnel need to access. The
and Hurme, 2010a,b).
effectiveness of risk management systems is dependent on a
However, these index based approaches have a number
company’s implementation and support for operational disci-
of shortcomings. They are based on subjective scaling and
pline (OD)-related programs to ensure that the process safety
weighting, with limited coverage and often unclear granular-
requirements are followed consistently at all levels of the
ity. Gentile et al. (2003) have attempted to improve on some
organization. Vaughen and Klein (2011) describe how poor OD
of the subjective factors in the inherent safety index by using
increases process safety risk and provide a tool to help monitor
fuzzy set theory. The modifications were essentially aimed at
and improve OD. Papadaki (2008) also reports on the motiva-
improving the sensitivity (either excessive or insufficient) in
tional factors necessary for improving operator commitment
the ranges selected for each of the various index parameters.
and involvement toward safety. In conclusion, despite the role
In this approach each factor is described by a linguistic variable
that human factors have played in major accidents, there is
whose range of interest is divided into fuzzy sets. For each set,
scant literature on understanding this from an inherent safety
a membership function is defined which has a specific shape
perspective. Table 8 lists the papers classified under human
describing the physical behavior of the set. This eliminates the
factors and management systems coordinate.
problems presented by the traditional interval approach for
parameter ranges. Khan and Amyotte (2004) proposed an Inte-
3.8. Assessment techniques
grated Inherent Safety Index (I2SI) that comprised of two main
sub-indices, the hazard index and an inherent safety poten-
As discussed earlier, design modifications rarely result in
tial index. The hazard index measures the damage potential of
a monotonic reduction of risk. Some form of quantifica-
the process, taking into account the hazard control measures.
tion is necessary to evaluate the trade-offs among various
The inherent safety potential index addresses the applicability
design options. This led to the development of a number of
of inherent safety principles to the process. The two sub-
metrics for measuring the inherent safeness of design options.
indices are combined to produce the I2SI value. Srinivasan and
Some of the major indices introduced in the last 11 years are
Nhan (2008) proposed a multivariate approach called inherent
benign-ness indicator to overcome these shortcomings. This
Table 8 – Classification of papers discussing human method uses principal component analysis to analyze various
factors. factors affecting the hazards in the process and to identify the
Paper Management most benign route. This methodology can also bring out the
coordinate similarities and differences between the routes. Using the con-
tributing factors, major hazards could be identified and proper
Bridges and Revondatew (2009)
Papadaki (2008) Fundamentals
safeguards taken. Table 9 lists the citation count of some of the
Hendershot (2007) major metrics available for inherent safety evaluation.
In summary, the focus of research on inherent safety in
Meel and Seider (2008) Model
Vaughen and Klein (2011) Qualitative review
the 21st century has remained on hazards with 87% of the 131
papers. This is in line with the philosophy of inherent safety,
398 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403

compound in Roche. They discovered an inherently safer sub-

Table 10 – Companies discussing inherent safety in the
new millennium.
ABB
ABS International, Inc.
Acu Tech Consulting Group
Air Products and Chemical Inc.
Arthur D. Little Inc Global Environ.
Baker Engineering and Risk Consultants, Inc.
BASF
BNFL PLC
BP Refining and Logistics Technology
BP Safety and Operations
BP Exploration
Cabot Corporation
Chilworth Technology Inc.
Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc.
Croda, Inc.
Det Norske Veritas (DNV)
Dow Chemical
DuPont
Flour Corporation
INBUREX Consulting GmbH
Siemens AG
IONIK Consulting
Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR)
PPG Industries
Eastman Chemical Company
Rohm and Haas Company
S2V Consulting
Saudi Arabian Fertilizer Co.
Shell Upstream International
SIS-Tech Solutions
Solutia Inc.
TBS Major Hazard Consultants
i.e. elimination or minimization of the hazards, rather than
controlling them.
4. Applications of inherent safety during
2001–2011
Progress has also been reported in the use of inherent safety
over the last 11 years. Here, we review its adoption in indus-
try, regulations and accident investigation, and for chemical
plant security analysis. Our survey of the literature revealed
that the authors of 78 papers had an industrial affiliation.
Table 10 lists the 32 companies involved. Although this is
an imperfect measure, it reveals a two-fold increase in the
number of companies discussing inherent safety, compared to
the 1990s. Information on the specific nature of the inherent
safety intervention adopted by the companies is sparse given
the sensitivity often associated with such developments. Here,
we highlight a few published cases. Beverage bottling plants
are required to maintain high standards for sanitation and
have to clean preparation tanks and lines to prevent contam-
ination, flavor carryover and corrosion. This cleaning often
requires high temperatures and hazardous chemicals (such as
chlorine). Miox corporation (Boeh and Christy, 2011) reported
the adoption of an electro-chemically activated clean-in-place
method that produces chlorine and other oxidant species
in situ by applying electricity to a solution of salt and water.
This inherently safer design thus generates the disinfectant
on-site and on demand using non-toxic consumables thus
minimizing hazards. As another example (Lopez et al., 2005),
discuss the hazards associated with the use of sodium chlo-
rite (and the formation of hypochlorite as a byproduct) during
the oxidation step while manufacturing a pharmaceutical
stitute, dimethyl sulfoxide, which provided equivalent yields
and purities and developed and demonstrated the new safer
process.
The many hazards in offshore oil and gas production have
been brought out by the various accidents over the years, rang-
ing from Piper Alpha (1988), to PetroBras P-36 (2001), Bombay
High (2005), and Deepwater Horizon (2010). Twinned with this
is the fact that, because of increasing demand for energy, and
most new oilfield discoveries are offshore, a large number of
new rigs and platforms are built every year. Further, different
projects offer unique challenges that preclude copy-and-paste
of traditional, well-known designs. Hence, the offshore pro-
duction industry offers an excellent test bed for applying
inherent safety principles. Many companies in this industry,
ranging from Kellogg Brown and Root (Chia et al., 2003), to BP
(Considine et al., 2010) and Shell (Gilmour and Deveney, 2010)
have reported proactive applications of inherent safety princi-
ples in the design of new oil and gas platforms. The interested
reader is referred to the review by Khan and Amyotte (2002).
Inherent safety principles have also been used by the
United States Chemical Safety and Hazard Identification Board
(CSB) to propose recommendations after accident investiga-
tions. Amyotte et al. (2011) studied the possibility of applying
various risk reduction measures in 63 accident investigations
conducted by CSB and concluded that inherent safety based
controls were applicable to 36% of 200 total examples. All the
four main principles – minimize, substitute, moderate and
simplify – were nearly equally applicable.
Subsequent to the events of September 11, 2001, chemical
plant security has received increasing attention. As in pro-
cess safety, chemical plant security is also concerned with
large inventories of flammable, explosive, and toxic materi-
als. Unlike process safety however, process security seeks to
prevent adverse events caused by factors of harmful intentions.
In such cases, since the frequency of the initiating event is
beyond the control of plant designers, the inherent vulnerabil-
ity of a process is in focus and can be reduced by using designs
that minimize or eliminate hazardous (flammable, explosive,
toxic) materials. This would make the plant safer against acci-
dents and also an unlikely target for the intentional creation of
disaster. Thus, inherently safer design can directly incorporate
considerations of security. Several authors have identified this
benefit of inherent safety (Bajpai and Gupta, 2005; Dunbobbin
et al., 2004; Hansson, 2010).
Since process safety related regulations such as the OSHA
1910 CFR in USA and Seveso II directives in Europe came into
effect in the 1990s, there has been speculation that inherent
safety would also find pride of place in regulatory texts. How-
ever, regulating inherent safety is not easy because inherently
safer design and implementation is a function of site and pro-
cess specific conditions. Contra Costa county in California is
the first to enact a safety ordinance specifically discussing
inherent safety in 1999. This ordinance explicitly requires
facilities to ‘consider the use of inherently safer systems in
the development and analysis of mitigation items resulting
from a process hazard analysis’ (CCPS, 2009). The Contra Costa
Health Service (CCHS) reported in 2007 that the number and
severity of chemical accidents have been decreasing since the
implementation of this ordinance (CCPS, 2009). However, the
small number of incidents makes it difficult to establish a
clear causal relationship between the ordinance and the num-
ber of incidences. More recently, New Jersey implemented the
Toxic Catastrophe Prevention Act and Prescriptive order for
 Process Safety and Environmental Protection 9 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) 389–403
Chemical Plant Security (CCPS, 2009) and the US congress
enacted the Chemical Facilities Anti-Terrorism Act (Hess,
2009). Both called for consideration of full range of inherent
safety options for chemical plant.
5. Discussion
The above reviews of the state of inherent safety, both from
new developments point-of-view as well as from the appli-
cations point-of-view, lead to the following conclusions. The
primary foundation of the field, the principles first expounded
by Kletz, is well understood. They are widely accepted as pro-
viding a sound philosophy for making better design decisions.
Numerous examples abound, many simple and easy-to-
understand ‘toy’ problems, and some of applications to real,
large-scale plants exist.
However, it appears that inherent safety continues to
remain the domain of safety specialists. It is yet to permeate
into the broader population of engineers. One way to improve
the uptake is through its incorporation in chemical engi-
neering curricula, as has been highlighted by several authors
(Edwards, 2005; Louvar and Hendershot, 2007; Papadaki, 2008;
Seay and Eden, 2008). There are two major challenges in this.
First, inherent safety is but one component of a safety course.
Although there are several books on inherent safety per se,
they probably offer too much coverage to be useful as course
material. Popular process safety books (such as Crowl and
Louvar, 2011) that are textbooks in university-level courses, on
the other hand, only mention the topic without providing ade-
quate guidance on their practice. Other educational material,
such as those from The Safety and Chemical Engineering Edu-
cation (SACHE) program are available, but incorporating them
into the curricula is left to the institution and instructor. This
void needs to be addressed and good models are necessary
that incorporate safety in general and inherent safety in par-
ticular in all stages of the curriculum. The current emphasis on
including sustainability thinking into engineering education
can offer a possible model and a companion in this journey.
Specialized continuing education programs on inherent safety
can be offered for practicing engineers. Finally, companies can
also include inherent safety in their training programs.
While there is a large body of research on various inher-
ent safety assessment methods, there has been relatively little
said on the best ways to incorporate them into the work
processes of practicing engineers. Metrics can be incorpo-
rated into process simulation and other design tools used
commonly by the designer. Based on the evaluation of the haz-
ards, the designer would be faced with the task of generating
alternate designs. An easy-to-query design support tool, con-
taining a database of various inherently safer design solutions,
could then offer focused alternatives that can be exam-
ined and incorporated. The case-based reasoning system of
(Heikkila et al., 1998) and iSafeBase proposed by (Srinivasan
et al., 2003) offer some starting points for such a development.
Expert systems (Palaniappan et al., 2002b) can also be incor-
porated into the design tools to automatically suggest design
modifications for routine situations and creativity methods
(Srinivasan and Kraslawski, 2006) for uncommon ones.
The need for inherent safety in the chemical industry
is larger today than ever. New chemical plants are embel-
lished with not only detail complexity (larger-scale, tens of
thousands of instruments, and hundreds of thousands of
computing devices) but also dynamic complexity (more tightly
399
integrated, with subtle cause-and-effect, and non-apparent
temporal effects). New processes based on bio- and nano-
technologies are entering the process industry. These are often
characterized by insufficient process and safety knowledge.
The applicability of inherent safety to these has to be demon-
strated. The detail and dynamic complexity of modern-day
plants also pose challenges to the human, who is simul-
taneously both the weakest and the strongest link, in the
loop. Ensuring that human actions would be inherently safe
through holistic consideration of human factors in every
aspect of design (from occupational health, to control system
schematics and plant layout) is also necessary for a sustain-
able plant, that is friendly to people, planet, and profit.
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