Guidelines for technical management of chemical process safety

The Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS) was formed to provide leadership and coordination to engineering approaches to safety in the chemical process industry. the center focuses its' activities on safety in the manufacturing, handling and storage of toxic flammable or explosive and reactive materials and those scientific and engineering practices that can prevent or mitigate episodic events involving the release of potentially hazardous materials. CCPS recognized, however, that enhancements in chemical process technologies alone would not be good enough to prevent catastrophic events such as Bhopal. Therefore, with the support of its advisory and managing boards, a multifaceted program was established to address the need for management commitment to the technical elements of chemical process safety. Commitment in any company must start at the top level. This paper, therefore, focuses on the importance of leadership, and how management demonstrates importance of leadership, and how management demonstrates leadership through creating a vision of the future and aggressively converts that vision into reality. The paper also discusses efforts within CCPS directed at engineering visions of process safety management. These efforts have been directed by the technical management subcommittee of CCPS who collectively represent centuries of experience in process safety.