Process safety fundamentals!

A new ISA course, Process Safety Fundamentals (EC50CT), provides a sound foundational understanding of leading process safety concepts, standards and procedures, and accentuates the need to regard process safety as a fundamental daily priority.

Process safety focuses on preventing significant industrial accidents, such as fires, explosions and chemical releases, in chemical plants and other facilities dealing with hazardous materials, such as refineries and oil and gas production installations.

Luis Garcia - Instructor

“Process safety is a continuous journey, rather than a destination, and everybody within a plant or manufacturing organization must undertake this journey and recognize what’s at stake,” says Luis Garcia, a consultant for Siemens Energy and Automation, a Certified Functional Safety Expert and the instructor of ISA’s Process Safety Fundamentals course. “Operators and technicians, but also engineers and managers—even though they may not be directly involved in safety administration—need to understand the critical importance of process safety, and recognize the serious risks if safety procedures are not followed.”

“This course shows that safety is everyone’s business,” continues Garcia, who for nearly 30 years has been working to develop process safety standards and procedures in the oil and gas, chemical and petrochemical sectors. “Safety provides the foundation for any plant to operate effectively. It can’t be viewed as a burden or an add-on step. It’s got to be approached as a critical need.”

ISA, Garcia says, has played an important role in elevating process safety through the development of the ISA84 functional safety standards. These standards improve the design, installation, operation and maintenance of Safety Instrumented Systems—the computer-based systems relied upon in most modern plants to prevent adverse safety, health and environmental consequences.

In addition to explaining the purpose and value of the ISA84 standards, ISA’s Process Safety Fundamentals course:

• Covers legal requirements.
• Describes the role of personnel in the Safety Life Cycle.
• Reveals how to determine and manage safety risks.
• Evaluates the basic characteristics of a SIS and their implications.
• Emphasizes the importance of maintenance in the operational phase.
• Discusses the differences between various industry-applicable standards.
• Serves as a preparatory course for a more advanced ISA offering: Safety Instrumented Systems—Design, Analysis and Justification (EC50).

Throughout his career, Garcia has participated in the design and development of instruments for many safety-related applications, such as solenoid valves. He has written several white papers, and has conducted seminars and workshops throughout Mexico, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Spain and Great Britain.

Garcia graduated with honors as a metallurgist and material scientist from Liverpool University, and holds a mechanical degree from Saint Joseph Technical College in Rosario, Argentina.

The next scheduled offering of Process Safety Fundamentals (EC50CT) will be on 20 May 2013 at ISA’s Columbia, Illinois USA regional training location. The last day to register for this class is 6 May 2013. The EC50CT course will also be offered as part of ISA SIS Boot Camp at ISA Technical Training Camp - Houston this coming June.