Multi-plant safety and security management in the chemical and process industries

The storage, handling, processing and distribution of an ever growing amount of chemical substances is inherent to today?s economy but intrinsically holds the risk of large scale accidents. Safety in chemical industrial areas is not limited to preventing accidental accidents. Since the September 11, 2001 World Trade Centre attacks in New York, society and industry are exploring pro-active security measures to counter terrorist attacks of any kind as well. The chemical industry is well aware of these safety and security risks and its day-by-day efforts prove this particular industrial sector worldwide to be very safety and security driven. Safety and security prevention measures to further reduce the likelihood of accidents and to protect against internal and external terrorism attacks on hardware (e.g. a chemical installation) and software (e.g. networked systems) can still be tackled more efficiently at the multi-plant level. An organization composed of safety and security experts from several chemical companies belonging to a multi-plant area - itself situated within a larger chemical cluster - could support striving for improved cross-company safety and security, and could thereby enhance public perception on these topics.
Empirical research revealed that safety and security managers acknowledge the importance of cross-company cooperation for knockonrisk reduction. This book develops the guidelines, recommendations, procedures and frameworks for facilitating a multi-plant structure aimed at supporting cross-company safety and security collaboration and management. The aim of this book surpasses the intended support of multi-plant safety and security awareness and offers easy-to-use information for actually setting up a safety and security culture on an aggregated multi-plant level.