title: The development of an audit technique to assess the quality of safety barrier management.
abstract: This paper describes the development of a management model to control barriers devised to prevent major hazard scenarios. Additionally, an audit technique is explained that assesses the quality of such a management system. The final purpose of the audit technique is to quantify those aspects of the management system that have a direct impact on the reliability and effectiveness of the barriers and, hence, the probability of the scenarios involved. First, an outline of the management model is given and its elements are explained. Then, the development of the audit technique is described. Because the audit technique uses actual major hazard scenarios and barriers within these as its focus, the technique achieves a concreteness and clarity that many other techniques often lack. However, this strength is also its limitation, since the full safety management system is not covered with the technique. Finally, some preliminary experiences obtained from several test sites are compiled and discussed.
authors.affiliation: Safety Science Group, Delft University of Technology, Netherlands. f.w.guldenmund@tbm.tudelft.nl
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Guldenmund
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hale
authors.forename: Louis
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Goossens
authors.forename: Jeroen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Betten
authors.forename: Nijs Jan
authors.initials: NJ
authors.lastname: Duijm
mesh_terms: D000062:Accidents, Occupational / Q000517:prevention & control; D015984:Causality; D002617:Chemical Industry / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards*; D003201:Computers; D003264:Containment of Biohazards / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards; D004189:Disaster Planning; D004781:Environmental Exposure / Q000517:prevention & control*; D005060:Europe; D005062:European Union; D017408:Guidelines as Topic; D015386:Hazardous Substances; D006801:Humans; D008330:Management Audit / Q000379:methods*; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D017751:Safety Management / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D012984:Software
chemical_list: D015386:Hazardous Substances