exida explains Blog

If you’re like me then you’ve been waiting for the new draft of IEC 61511 to be officially issued since its release has been delayed for some time.  However, a draft has been released and can help in preparing end users for what’s to come.  The question…

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On the 10th anniversary of the BP Texas City Refinery explosion, let’s pause to reflect on one of the lessons learned from this disaster. The process had multiple layers of protection, including operating procedures, BPCS control and alarms, independent alarms, and relief devices.  There was additional instrumentation…

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Industry Benchmark Survey on Alarms as Safeguards and Independent Protection Layers (IPLs)

exida recently conducted an industry benchmark survey on the practices for the use of alarms as safeguards and IPLs. With over 200 safety practitioners from around the world providing responses, you can use the survey findings to…

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Those operating in the process world should be familiar with the concept of Functional Safety Management (FSM) and the need to have well defined processes and procedures in place.  Otherwise, how else will they be able to ensure that their Safety Instrumented System (SIS) and plant…

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Both Process Safety Analysis (PHA) and Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA) occur in the early stage of the Functional Safety Lifecycle, detailed in both IEC 61511 and IEC 61508. They both serve significant roles in the whole process safety management. Yet, as a facilitator…

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You will probably not hear me sing the LEGO® Movie’s “Everything is Awesome” song, I’ll keep that private (and you should be thankful to me for that). However as we just released the LOPAx™ module of the new exSILentia® v4 platform, I have come to…

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Each month at exida, we strive to spotlight one of our products that makes the job easier for today's industry professional. In this blog, I wanted to talk about the exida publication  Practical SIL Target Selection - Risk Analysis per the IEC 61511 Safety Lifecycle which is based on numerous…

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I just read a great article in the May issue of IEEE Spectrum magazine called “Managing Risk and Responsibility During a Crisis.”  The author Robert N. Charette says “If the American people desire the federal government to be their risk manager of first resort, then an open and…

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I remember the first time I ever saw a spreadsheet program. It was called “VisiCalc" and ran on a Commodore PET computer. My first thought was, “What is that good for?” Then I tried it and was totally hooked. I conclude that the creation of the spreadsheet has changed…

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We are going to continue discussing the results from exida’s recently published industry benchmark survey on the practices for the use of alarms as safeguards and IPLs. Over 200 safety practitioners from around the world provided responses. This entry will discuss the relationship between alarms identified as safeguards and…

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This was a question posed to me by an engineering contractor the other day.  Although I found the question quite strange, it made me think “okay, why do they need us?”  I suppose there are a few answers:

1. Regarding the end user perspective, we exist to provide an independent third-party…

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