Would you be surprised to hear us at SIS-TECH say that Safe Automation is NOT just about Safety Instrumented Systems?   Safe Automation is not even primarily about Safety Instrumented Systems!  Safe Automation of a process industry plant begins not with identifying instrumented protection layers but with designing a robust basic process control system.

In the first episode of our “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we will introduce critical aspects for designing inherently safer (and more reliable) process automation systems. 

Episode 2: How do the Inherently Safer Design Strategies impact process automation design?

Experienced process engineers use the inherently safer design strategies of Minimize, Substitute, Moderate, and Simplify to design facilities that are inherently less hazardous. 

Did you know the operating plan and these same four inherently safer design strategies are also important for the automation designer to consider?

In the second Episode of our “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we will discuss how the four inherently safer design strategies apply when designing a robust basic process control system.

Webinar Series: Safe Automation in the Process Industry

Episode 3: Did Inherently Safer Automation Design Make Us Safe?

Once we have completed the design of the process and its industrial automation system, identifying protection layers is crucial for ensuring that the process risk is managed to a tolerable level. Do you know how protection layers are identified and how a plant determines how many protection layers will be enough?

In the third Episode of our “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we will discuss why we use the term “inherently safer” instead of “inherently safe” and introduce the fundamentals of process safety hazards and risk analysis.

Join us!

Webinar Series: Safe Automation in the Process Industry

Episode 4: Are a Process Hazards Analysis (PHA) and a Hazards and Risk Assessment (H&RA) the same thing?

In the third episode, we reviewed the main activities of the risk analysis used in evaluating process hazards, commonly referred to as a Process Hazards Analysis. However, if the risk analysis indicates that more risk reduction needs to be considered, either to meet the tolerable risk criteria or to satisfy ALARP principles, protection layers need to be identified. Do you know the key differences between safeguards and protection layers?

In the fourth episode of our “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we will discuss the difference between a PHA and an H&RA, focusing on the risk assessment activities that should follow the risk analysis. We will also review the core attributes that should apply to all process safety safeguards and the additional attributes that apply to protection layers.

Come join us!

In the fourth episode of this series, we discussed the different roles that PHA and Risk Assessment methods such as LOPA play in the overall H&RA process, emphasized key differences between safeguards and protection layers, and reviewed some essential protection layer attributes that need to be carefully considered during the risk assessment phase of the overall H&RA process (a.k.a., the “allocation of safety functions to protection layers”).

Before implementing those instrumented protections, however, the project team will need to be familiar with the standards that govern instrumented safeguard and instrumented protection layer specification, design, implementation, operation, and maintenance.

In the fifth episode of our “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we will review the nearly 30-year history of some of the key application-neutral industry standards that are most closely related to the use of instrumented protections against process safety hazards.

Leading the presentation is Eloise Roche, a Senior SCAI Consultant with SIS-TECH, bringing her wealth of expertise to the discussion.

Correctly identifying the instrumented protective systems (IPS) needed for a facility is an indispensable step in executing functional safety. However, instrumented systems must also be carefully specified and designed to succeed in achieving the safety performance assumed in H&RA studies.

In the sixth episode of the “Safe Automation in the Process Industry” webinar series, we:

• Summarize the content of a high-quality specification for both LI-PL and SIS,      
• Review additional design constraints that apply to SIS, and
• Discuss designing the LI-PL and SIS to make them more operable, maintainable, and easier to include in monitoring programs.

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