Incident Report

Subject:                   HSE RR915 - The major accident failure rates project: concept phase

Date of Email report:   Sat 10/03/2012

Report Detail:

The major accident failure rates project is a joint venture between the UK and the Netherlands to address the feasibility of updating generic failure rates used in risk assessment for major hazard chemical plants. The approach addresses the two essential parts of a failure rate:

• accidents where there has been a loss of containment of a hazardous chemical;
• and the plant containment population from which the accidents originated.
  

The key parties working together are the Health and Safety Laboratory (HSL) in the UK and the National Institute for Public Health and Environment (RIVM) in the Netherlands, coordinated by White Queen Safety Strategies. The key stakeholders in the project are the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) in the UK and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment (SZW) in the Netherlands. While the ultimate aim of the project is to provide the foundation for developing failure rates there are other reasons for its inception, particularly concerns about major accident analysis and causation sharing that have arisen after the Buncefield and Texas City accidents.
This report and the work it describes were funded by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Its contents, including any opinions and/or conclusions expressed, are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect HSE policy.

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