This is a question I often get asked when I’m teaching our FSE100 course on Functional Safety, when we discuss the purpose of Proof Testing and coverage. It’s amazing how many end users assume perfect proof testing (i.e. 100% coverage), that is capable of finding, all the…
exida explains Blog
- by Dr. Steve Gandy, CFSP
- Thursday, August 24, 2017
- Functional Safety
Why Proof Test Coverage Is So Important For A SIF to Achieve Its Target SIL?
- by Todd Stauffer
- Friday, August 18, 2017
- Alarm Management
Alarm Management and the Great American Solar Eclipse
Throughout history, total solar eclipses have been a significant event. In primitive societies, eclipses were viewed with fear or as important omens. In the US, the upcoming “Great American Solar Eclipse” is creating much excitement. From buying “official” eclipse-viewing glasses, to paying $1500 or more…
- by Dr. William Goble, CFSE
- Thursday, August 10, 2017
- Certification
IEC 61508 Functional Safety Certificates - To Accept or not to Accept?
I get an email that includes a “certificate” of some sort most every week. The sender asks “Can I accept this certificate?” Or the sender might ask “Are these failure rates valid for the process industries?”
At exida we have some specific criteria we use when performing third party…
- by Loren Stewart, CFSE
- Thursday, August 03, 2017
- Functional Safety
Outer Banks: How Could This Massive Power Outage Happen?
I, like many others, was stunned to hear that there was a major power outage covering the Outer Banks. Being an engineer, my instincts were to immediately investigate what happened and what steps occurred to lead to that point. Even before I did research, my mind was already asking…
- by John Yozallinas, CFSE
- Thursday, July 13, 2017
- Functional Safety
Making the Most of Customer Feedback
Your organization gets information, feedback, and requests from customers all the time. It’s up to you to do some preliminary analysis and determine what the customer really wants. Do they want to buy something? Do they want to complain about something? Do they have a need for which no…
- by Dave Gunter
- Thursday, July 06, 2017
- Industrial Cybersecurity
exida Cyber Blog Series 04 - Cybersecurity Metrics, Diagnostics, and Alarms: What’s What?
Co-written by Todd Stauffer, Director of Alarm Management Services at exida
A wise man once said, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” Let's apply this to the world of cybersecurity to discuss the importance of cybersecurity metrics and how they are different from a cyber diagnostic and a…
- by Dr. Steve Gandy, CFSP
- Thursday, June 22, 2017
- Functional Safety
Why Run-to-Fail Is Not A Good Maintenance Strategy For SIS
One of the fundamentals of the Probability of Failure on Demand (PFDavg) calculations in SIL verification analysis, is the concept of a constant failure-rate during useful life of the equipment. Probabilistic calculations assume that the failure rate of the devices used in a Safety Instrumented System (SIS)…
- by Dave Gunter
- Thursday, June 08, 2017
- Industrial Cybersecurity
exida Cyber Blog Series 03 - Process Safety and Cybersecurity, Related or Still Distant Cousins?
To be clear, the above title is meant to capture your attention. We all understand and know that it is unusual for a Process Safety engineer and the IT architect to possess detailed knowledge of both safety and security. In today’s world, the operators, engineers, design and support personnel of…
- by Dr. Steve Gandy, CFSP
- Wednesday, May 31, 2017
- Functional Safety
Making Use of Leading and Lagging Indicators – Are You Using These for Functional Safety?
Some of you reading this may not be aware or familiar with the terms “leading” and “lagging” indicators, when applied to Functional Safety. The concept isn’t new but does provide significant benefit when applying this to Functional Safety because, if used correctly, these indicators can help significantly improve performance. …
- by Dave Gunter
- Wednesday, May 24, 2017
- Industrial Cybersecurity
exida Cyber Blog Series: 02 - Does your position qualify as a Cyber Sensitive position?
That’s a great question.
What is a Cyber sensitive position?
A cyber sensitive position is a subset of a job position description that can be graded as Ultra, High, Medium or Low sensitivity with respect to cybersecurity assets and associated potential consequences that may impact an operating company.
What…
- by Dr. Steve Gandy, CFSP
- Wednesday, May 17, 2017
- Functional Safety
Why Is Functional Safety An Important Piece of Process Safety Management?
It’s interesting to note that with the release of the 2016 edition of IEC61511, there’s more emphasis being placed on the need for better functional safety management. Having taught many courses on Functional Safety over the past few years, I find that most of the…
- by Dave Gunter
- Friday, May 12, 2017
- Industrial Cybersecurity
exida Cyber Blog Series: 01 - What is Cyber Hygiene?
exida would like to welcome our new director of cybersecurity services Dave Gunter. Dave will be taking us through a multi part blog series based on general cybersecurity evolving into how it pertains to your industrial work environment and what you should do to protect your company…
- by Dr. William Goble, CFSE
- Wednesday, April 19, 2017
- Certification
Tales from the Certification Wars - Proven In Use versus Certification
There have been passionate debates in email and meetings about “Proven In Use” versus IEC 61508 certification. Most debates characterize these evaluation techniques as competing methods. In 2000 when IEC 61511 was being written there were few IEC 61508 certified products on the market. The…
- by John Yozallinas, CFSE
- Friday, March 31, 2017
- Certification
Knowing Scope of Work (SOW)
There was a joke I heard many years ago that went like this…
3 workers were hired to run telephone lines. The first part of their job was to install the poles on which the wires would run. Each day, the foreman would ask the workers how many poles…
- by Todd Stauffer
- Monday, March 20, 2017
- Alarm Management
What do Nuisance Alarms, the 80-20 Rule, Mental Models, and More Have in Common?
Most everyone has heard of the “80-20 rule”. It asserts that for many situations, roughly 80% of the effects (outcomes) come from 20% of the causes (inputs). This rule was first proposed in the early 1900s by Vilfredo Pareto, who was an Italian engineer, sociologist, economist, political scientist, philosopher,…