Current Research Developments Future Needs-

Thomas W. Carmody

Director of CCPS

AIChE, 345 East 47th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017

I wish to bring you up-to-date on four relatively new developments in the area of chemical process safety man- agement research. These developments are: first, the OECD Research discussions concerning Prevention of Major Plant Accidents; second, the results of the CCPS January 1989 Chemical Process Safety Management Con- ference in Atlanta in discussing knowledge gaps and re- search opportunities; and third, CCPS's concern and ac- tivities relative to technology transfer of chemical process safety management to smaller businesses. Finally, I dis- CUSS some observations from a DRAFT Tufts University research study on Corporate Management of Chemical Risks-the Technology Transfer for Improving Chemical Risk Management.

OECD, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, is having a series of meetings to determine their position with respect to developing a guide for pre- vention of major chemical accidents for OECD members. At OECD's February 19-22,1990 meeting in London, the issue of research by public authorities in preventing major accidents was discussed. The public authority rep- resentatives focused their research needs primarily on learning

how organizations were complying with major acci- dent prevention regulation, how organizations were improving with respect to prevention of possible major accidents, and finally how public authorities could obtain the technical ex- pertise needed to deal effectively with organizations which must use such expertise to prevent potential major accidents.

CCPS pointed out that classical technical research, plus research with respect to technical management of chemi- cal process safety, were needed in addition to these gov- ernmental types of research.

At the subsequent OECD meeting in Boston last week (May 7-10, 1990), a full day was spent discussing what is happening in research; on coordination of research and technology transfer; and on future research needs. In this session, the research in question encompassed only emergency preparedness and major accident prevention. The results of this session (available in another month or two) should be most interesting to review. The potential outcome of these OECD meetings is that member coun- tries may be willing to establish OECD as a clearinghouse for current and planned research activities relative to emergency preparedness and major accident prevention and that these activities will include both con- ventional chemical engineering research, as well as soft research, le., human factors and chemical process safety management. OECD does not want to manage the re- search--only provide a clearinghouse to improve corn- munication and prevent duplication where it is not wanted.

At CCPS's January 1989 Technical Management meet- ing in Atlanta, the final session was devoted to identifica-

204 Julv. 1990

tion of gaps and possible research activities for the pre- vention of major accidents. This discussion resulted in the following list of developments or suggested projects. You will immediately note the list is much broader than the area of research relative to process safety man- agement.

User-Friendly Methods of Pressure Relief System Design

Develop user-friendly techniques for calculation and design of reactive, flashing, and multi-phase relief sys- tems, and determination of back-pressure effects of sys- tems down-stream of the relief device.

Fluid Curtoin Systems to Mitigate Hazardous Releases

Develop design data and demonstrate effectiveness on use of steam, water, ammonia curtains, and fog or spray systems to mitigate release of hazardous vapors.

Blanketing Systems for Liquid Spills

Develop additional performance data on the effective- ness of blanketing systems, including foams, water, sheeting, and granular materials, to reduce vaporization from liquid pools.

Research to Develop o Clearer Definition of "Worst Case Scenorios"

Should- include a definition of credible events. Work is underway by AIChE's DIERS group (DIERS stands for Design Institute for Emergency Relief Systems).

Monitoring and Detection Devices for Ho~rdous Goses

Develop more cost-effective, reliable, and accurate monitoring and detection devices for hazardous materi- als in the atmosphere.

Effectiveness of Shelters

Develop information through research on the practical effectiveness of shelters, including houses, industrial and public buildings, automobiles, etc.

Logic Diograms for Evacuation Decision Moking

Develop logic diagrams for shelter-in-place versus evacuation to speed decision making in the event of re- lease of hazardous materials.

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User Friendly Risk Analysis Systems

Develop user-friendly cost-effective risk analysis sys- tems usable by smal.1er and medium sized facilities.

Improved Dismersion Models

Develop cost-effeciive proven systems for dispersion modeling for dense gases under a variety of static and dynamic conditions. Currently available modeling sys- tems are slow, cumbersome, and require computer ca- pacity.

Workshops for LEKS

Conduct workshops, co-sponsored with EPA, on Guidelines for Technical Management of Chemical Process Safety for LEPCs at various locations around the country. CCPS’s Planning Committee reviewed this list and has

incorporated the second and third items into the CCPS future projects list.

The next area for research I want to touch on is an area of soft science, but an area of vital concern to many gov- ernment, industry and professional organizations. When we talk about process safety management, we always get into discussions about the question of how to improve technology transfer to smaller companies and companies not involved in the safety activities of associations such as CMA, CCPA or API. If the usual formula holds, probably, these large organizations encompass 80% of the hazard- ous chemical business but only 20% of the companies in- volved with these materials.

CCPS has two proiiects that actively address these con- cerns:

Our Guide to Resources for Chemical Process Safety, scheduled for publication late 1990, will en- deavor to list all contractors, consultants and com- panies working in the process safety arena by name and by area of expertise. A recently started project, Guidelines for Process Safety in Smaller Operations, should be available sometime late in 1991. This will primarily be a technical guideline dealing with design and operat- ing practices in smaller operations that handle highly toxic or reactive materials whether they are a part of a small company or a large company.

Beyond these active projects, we have had continuing discussions within CCPS as to how our books on techni- cal management of process safety both for the manage- ment level and the plant level, can be more widely dis- seminated and used by those companies which have a need for them. We have no magic answer for this, no ac- tive research project to shed light on this issue, but we continue to actively discuss the issue.

One of the more interesting programs on how to dis- seminate information to smaller businesses was covered earlier by Dr. Doug Rausch of the Dow Chemical Com- pany. Dow’s Product Stewardship program described by him ties in very nicely with the CMA and the Canadian Chemical Producers’ Association Responsible Care Pro- grams. Here, I thin’k, Doug did an excellent job describ- ing how their Product Stewardship program deals with the safety of a customer’s plant operations, i.e., Dow feels an obligation to know how the customer stores, handles, and manages highly toxic or reactive material sold to him by Dow.

Finally, I want to tell you about the work of Prof. Michael Baram, Esq., of the Center for Environmental Management, Tufts University. At the request ofEPA, he recently completed a draft research report entitled: “Cor-

porate Management of Chemical Risks: Initiatives in Re- sponse to SARA Title 111” in the United States. We had the privilege of reviewing this and were particularly in- trigued with Chapter 7 entitled: Technology Transfer for Improving Chemical Risk Management. This particular chapter emphasizes that organizations which have highly toxic material are expanding their efforts to let customers know the details of how to safely handle the highly toxic materials. I would like to quote a few paragraphs from this report:

“The transfer of risk management information from chemical producers downstream to chemical proces- sors and end user firms was established before Bhopal and the OSHA hazard communication rule (effective in mid-1985). However, these two developments as well as the passage of SARA have stimulated more intensive use of downstream technology transfer.

“Although the information being transferred in- cludes some which is required by federal laws and reg- ulations (such as the material safety data sheets and la- bels that manufacturers are required to provide their customers by OSHA’s Hazard Communication stand- ard), much of the information being transferred is not legally required. Based on our cases (the cases studied in the report), the motives for the voluntary transfer of information from one firm to another vary, but in most instances, appear to be two-fold: (1) to prevent acci- dents at customer facilities in order to reduce the inci- dence of lawsuits by customers’ employees and others who may be injured, (2) to improve marketing and sales through increased customer appreciation and loyalty. Not surprisingly, much of companies’ technology trans- fer activities is done for specific loss control and profit maximization purposes.

“While there are no assurances that the recipients of information will put it to proper use, it is reasonable to expect that the diffusion of knowledge now taking place will eventually accrue to the benefit of public safety and the environment.” In short, Prof. Baram is stating that for sometime, sell-

ers of hazardous chemicals-highly reactive or toxic- have been transferring process safety information to their customers. Recent reguIations have further stimulated this transfer. However, we are not sure that the recipients are using the information.

On this latter point, we are told in specific cases that suppliers have followed up on the application of the pro- cess safety, as well as other safety information, and if the customer is not carrying out proper safety practices, the material is no longer sold to that customer.

Broad inclusion of this latter concept in the Responsi- ble Care-type programs might go far to widely improving process safety.

Here in Canada, this concept seems to be taking hold. Mr. Jean Belanger’s comments earlier in this meeting tes- tify to this as follows:

“The Codes don’t just apply to the member com- panies. Members are expected to ensure that any com- panies manufacturing products on their behalf, are aware of the risks and work with the same diligence that is expected from our members.

“If distributors or suppliers are found to be coming up short in meeting the criteria for handling a com- pany’s products, our members must be, and are, ready to sever their business dealings with those other par- ties. It may be a tough decision to have to make some- times, but as we all know, the mistakes of a third party can often reflect badly on a whole industry.” Hopefully, these few observations will aid efforts to es-

tablish future needs in the area of chemical process safety management.

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