Our consultants are drawn from a variety of backgrounds and have extensive experience in process industries ranging from oil & petrochemical, through fine chemical & pharmaceutical to food and drink industries. Each of our consultants is aware of the practical difficulties and constraints of implementing process modifications at operational sites and they aim to ensure that advice given is both pragmatic and cost beneficial.
More than 70% of dry materials handled by Process Industry are capable of giving rise to dust explosions, if fine dust (<500μm particle size) from these materials are dispersed as cloud in air. Our consultants have more than 90 years' collective experience of assessing dust explosion risks and providing pragmatic solutions to control the hazards associated with the handling of combustible dusts.
The handling of flammable liquids and gases in Process Industry creates the potential for explosion hazards, in the form of volume explosions, vapour cloud explosions, mist explosions, or boiling liquid expanding vapour explosions (BLEVEs). Our consultants have a thorough grasp of explosion phenomena and prevention/protection measures that may be applied to control the hazard from them.
As well as posing a risk to personnel, industrial fires can have a serious business impact. According to insurance statistics, more than half of businesses who suffer a major fire fail to recover fully from the consequences. Our consultants are well versed in assessing both the life safety and business risks associated with industrial fire hazards and recommending practical loss prevention solutions.
The Dangerous Substances and Explosive Atmospheres Regulations (DSEAR) place duties on owners / operators of installations where Dangerous Substances, capable of creating explosive atmospheres, are handled, to ensure an acceptable level of explosion safety in respect of threat to people.
Compliance with DSEAR requires formal assessments to be undertaken relating to understand how, where and why explosive atmospheres can arise (Area Classification) and to confirm that suitable and sufficient control measures are in place to minimise risk to people (Explosion Hazard Risk Assessment).
DSEAR reflects the same legal requirements in the UK as provided by the European Union Directive 1999/92/EC (ATEX).