Consideration of Natural Hazards in the Design and Risk Management of Industrial Facilities

Recent chemical accidents precipitated by natural disasters have prompted governments in Europe, the United States and Japan, among other countries, to re-evaluate current practices for the design and risk management of chemical industrial facilities. This paper presents an overview of the natural hazard design considerations and external events risk management requirements in the industrial sector, with particular emphasis on chemical industry practices in the United States, Japan, and Europe. The analysis shows that while regulations exist to insure that industrial plant structures are being built to resist natural hazard events (up to the design level event), there are few laws to address the performance of non-structural elements and safety and emergency response measures during a natural disaster. Furthermore, country laws generally refer to natural hazards only indirectly, and provisions to prevent or respond to simultaneous disasters from single or multiple sources concurrent with the natural disaster are usually not present. The paper highlights some initiatives undertaken by individual countries to address external hazards in the prevention of concurrent chemical accidents, as well as gaps in current regulatory requirements.

CRUZ NARANJO Ana-Maria;  OKADA Norio; 

2008-04-04

SPRINGER

JRC35118

0921-030X,   

http://www.springerlink.com/content/102967/?p=0579bf884b524ba69137bd7fcc0fd5b6&pi=7,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC35118,   

10.1007/11069-007-9118-1,