Abstract of Meeting Paper

Society for Risk Analysis - Europe 1998 Annual Meeting

Quantitative Risk Assessment in the Process Industry: A Customer-Driven Approach. D. Agoropoulos (telephone 00 44 151 3735601, fax 00 44 151 3735058, e-mail d.agoropoulos@msmail.trctho.simis;) and S. R. Shield (telephone 00 44 151 3735856, fax 00 44 151 3735058, e-mail s.r.shield@msmail.trctho.simis), Hazard & Risk Management Group, Shell Global Solutions, P.O.Box 1, Chester CH1 3SH, UK

The use of Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA) in the energy sector has experienced a tremendous increase in recent years. Starting from oil/gas exploration and production offshore through LPG marketing onshore, QRA has expanded to the onshore oil, gas and chemicals process industries. From a plant operator's viewpoint the main drivers for QRA are :

• regulatory compliance with SEVESO II at minimum cost
• rapid optimisation of the layout of new plants
• integration with safety management systems to help identify risk
• hot-spots and rank mitigation options.

However it is often the case that available QRA tools and services do not meet these requirements. Shell Global Solutions have responded to this need by developing a state-of-the-art software tool to perform risk assessments for onshore oil, gas and chemicals plants. Physical effects modelling is based on Shell's state-of-the-art extensive know-how in hazards assessment, which is now available to 3rd parties. The tool is novel because it is map-based and can be tailored to the site under investigation by taking account of the actual, rather than generic, design, operation and maintenance practice. It can therefore meet the operators? drivers in a realistic, cost-effective and flexible way.

Examples of the application of the risk tool to oil/gas processing plants will be presented and discussed.