A Fertiliser Company Approach to Improving Process Safety Performance

Keywords: Process safety, process, safety, competence, indicators.

A strong track record places Yara among the industry leaders with respect to health, environmental and safety performance. Yara believes every accident is preventable. This is the basis for a focused safety programme within the company.

Process Safety took on an even greater focus following two accidents. In December 2008 and June 2009 explosions occurred in the nitrophosphate NPK plant in Yara Porsgrunn, Norway and in the ammonia plant in Yara Tertre, Belgium. Both accidents involved severe material damage, but without serious injury to people.

Recognising the non-acceptability of these two accidents and the seriousness of several other recent incidents, Yara established a task force to identify necessary improvements in Yara’s Process Safety work.

The key elements found were to a large extent to be related to human factors at all levels of the organisation. The paper addresses how Yara is strengthening its focus on process safety with more attention to operational discipline and the review and development of the competence requirements of operators, engineers and leaders.

During the last year Yara has updated all HAZOP analysis and performed extended safety integrity level analysis. The safety gaps identified are being closed within a defined time.

The process safety performance is also being closely followed up by indicators and measures. A new set of leading indicators is established to support the management at all levels to have better understanding of the status and to act whenever necessary.

Working on developing leadership and technical competence combined with the right process safety indicators will provide the next step of Process Safety development.

Jan-Petter Fossum and Hash Navsaria, Yara International ASA, Bygdøy allé 2, N-0202 Oslo, Norway.

24 pages, 10 figures, 3 references.