Integration of safety management effectiveness into QRA calculations

Quantitative Risk Analysis (QRA) has become an often used method in the process industry for improving safety and for land-use planning. In computing the risk by this methodology the frequency of an accident is often assessed by using generic failure frequencies which are based on historical data of incidents from databases. Little or no adjustment is made for the effectiveness of the safety management of the industrial site. Since most incidents are caused by management problems, QRA has to take into account the local safety management system. Otherwise, the results of QRA will not provide reliable information of the hazards and the corresponding risk from installations. Therefore, today's understanding of safe industrial operations requires an integrated risk assessment under the consideration of technical, organizational, and managerial aspects. This article describes a method which allows assessing the effectiveness of the local safety management system and its integration into the QRA using a single management factor. This method was developed with the aim of providing a tool which would allocate a quantitative measure for the effectiveness of the local Safety Management System for the purpose of using it directly in the QRA. © 2009 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Process Saf Prog, 2009