2023

The EPSC Highlights 2023 are:

Maastricht Process Safety Conference
With over 360 participants the Maastricht event provided a great platform for sharing practical knowledge and networking. Presentations and photos are available at the conference website.

EPSC Technical Meetings
The spring TSC in Leverkusen at Covestro and the fall TSC in Milan at ENI included great presentations (see members only area) and networking.

Big Data and Digitalization
Digitalization continues to provide options for safer plants as discussed at the 8th 2023 Global Conference on Process Safety and Big Data organized together with CCPS.

Participation at DIERS and Turkish Process Safety Community
EPSC participated and presented at the Design Institute for Emergency Response Systems (Braunschweig) and the Turkish Chemical Engineering Association (Istanbul).

EPSC Learning Sheets
A booklet was produced and distributed with over 50 typical industrial incidents with the relevant aspects to avoid them. It includes a nice index and is available as a browsable version as well as a PDF download. EPSC Learning Sheets, available in many languages, have become widely appreciated by industry. Again 10 interesting cases were discussed.

International Process Safety Week
In a joint effort leading associations try to raise awareness for process safety in a yearly international process safety week. In 2024 the Global Process Safety Week will take place from December 2 - 6 and will offer webinars, panel discussions and case studies.

Webinars 2023

 Webinars continued to be a great forum for sharing and discussing on process safety topics:

• EPSC Promoted Webinars are becoming well established with interesting presentations from Solution Providers: AcuTech, HIMA, PPCL, Versatec and Vysus Group.
• The Digitalization Working Group continued to organized webinars to discuss progression on practical tools.

 Progression in active Working Groups

• PHA Efficiency: The 5 sub-groups finalized the main work on HAZOP efficiency, practical readiness checklist, typicals and useful KPI’s.
• Process Safety in Pharma and Food developed their own Process Safety Fundamentals that were published and translated.
• Unwanted Polymerization finalized the detailed discussions on operational practices and design to avoid unwanted polymerization of e.g. butadiene.
• Fluor Free Foams (for emergency response): This Working Group started in October 2023.
  
• Early Leak Detection New techniques become available that e.g. use ultrasonic or IR to quickly detect gas leakages. The Working Group discusses the new options.
• Chemical Hazard Analysis (CHA) Reactive hazards need to be well understood before starting the HAZOP. A new Working Group is formed that will discuss the good practices.
• CHEF/RAST A 10 webinar session training was provided on the Chemical Engineering Fundamentals (CHEF). The RAST Users Group continues to discuss practical cases to share experience with the RAST tool.

Benchmark Study
EPSC executed for the 6th year a benchmark study on process safety statistics.

Members
Members remain appreciating EPSC: four new full members (Ineos, Nobian, Stahl and Yara) and one new associated member joined EPSC.

Relations
EPSC continued to strengthen relation with relevant associations: CEFIC Plant & Process Safety (Jean Godts), FABIG (Guillaume Vannier), Seveso Expert Group (Stefan Leiner), VCI (Thilo Hoechst), DECHEMA (Andreas Förster), EFCE and WP Loss Prevention (Bruno Fabiano), Safety Delta Netherlands (Arjan van Dijk), Essenscia (Geert Boogaerts), GESIP (Celine Leroy), Chemical Industry Association (Phil Scott), Phosgene working group (Stefan Drees), IE-net (Frank Verschuren), Eurochlor (Ton Manders), Energy Institute (Mark Scanlon), OECD (Marie-Ange Baucher), Federchimica (Giuseppe Astarita), CCPS (Shakeel Kadri and Willi Meier), AIChE (Trish Kern), Last Fire (Niall Ramsden), Center of Safety Excellence (Juergen Schmitt).

---

2022

The EPSC Highlights 2022 are:

Members
Members remain appreciating EPSC and three new full members (Eli Lilly, Syngenta, Umicore) and three new associated members (ABS Group, HIMA, Tecsa) joined EPSC.

2nd European Conference on Plant & Process Safety – Antwerp
The Antwerp event provided a great opportunity to network and share about practical process safety learnings, among 300 technical safety specialists. With a special anniversary reception, 40 presentations and 22 booths at the network forum, the event has become a well-recognized and appreciated congress. The 3rd European Conference on Plant & Process Safety will take place on 13 & 14 December 2023 in Maastricht, The Netherlands.

Big Data and Digitalization
The 7th Big Data & Digital Conference was organized together with CCPS and had about 100 participants. Digitalization will continue to be important for the industry and next year’s event will be again at DECHEMA in Frankfurt in October 2023.

Technical Meetings
The spring (Berlin) and fall (Budapest) TSC meetings took place as face to face meetings, with the option to join on-line. With a strong program and a nice location the TSC’s remain the core of EPSC for sharing and networking. Minutes and presentations can be found in the “members only” area on the EPSC website.

Webinars
Webinars continued to be a great forum for sharing and discussing on process safety topics:

• EPSC Promoted Webinar had 6 interesting presentations from solution providers where typically about 300 people register. The presentations are available at the EPSC website for all.
• The Digitalization Working Group organized webinar sessions on relevant topics like “modeling of heat shielding on sites”. All employees of members companies are invited to join these webinars ad discussion. Presentations are available at the EPSC website.

CHEF/RAST
A 10 webinar session training was provided on the Chemical Engineering Fundamentals (CHEF). These principals are relevant for all technical safety specialists and are the basis for the Risk Analysis Screening Tool (RAST). People that have followed the CHEF course and work with RAST can join the EPSC RAST Users Group where actual cases are discussed.

EPSC Learning sheets
EPSC learning sheets have become widely appreciated by industry. They are available in 19 languages and the subscription list is growing every year.

Progression in active Working Groups

• Process Safety Fundamentals did become available in 11 languages and gained in practical use and appreciation.
• PHA Efficiency: The 5 work streams finalized the main work on HAZOP efficiency, practical readiness checklist, typicals and useful KPI’s.
• Leadership in Process Safety: The working group made a leadership development experience available for all, that was tested by the board. A flyer on the website can link you to partners that can provide the session for you.
• Process Safety in Pharma and Consumer Industries shared on best practices during the active sessions and developed the Process Safety Fundamentals for Pharma.
• Energy Transition & Renewables: The working group participants continued to discuss cases and their hazards to raise awareness. Some of the presentations are available at the EPSC website.
•  Unwanted Polymerization had detailed discussions on operational practices and design on how to avoid unwanted polymerization of butadiene.

EPSC Benchmark Study
EPSC executed for the 5th year a benchmark study on process safety incidents. Incident rates and main cause frequency of the participating companies were made available anonymously in an easy overview, which can be found in the “members only” area. It is the largest and best documented benchmark study available including over a billion manhours.

Relations
EPSC continued to strengthen interaction with related associations including CEFIC (Jean Godts), FABIG (Guillaume Vannier), Seveso Expert Group (Stefan Leiner), VCI (Thilo Hoechst), DECHEMA (Andreas Förster), Process-Net (Maike Andresen), EFCE and Loss Prevention (Bruno Fabiano), Safety Delta Netherlands (Arjan van Dijk), Essenscia (Geert Boogaerts), GESIP (Frederic Pavard), Chemical Industry Association (Phil Scott), Phosgene working group (Kurt Meurer), IE-net (Frank Verschuren), Eurochlor (Ton Manders), Energy Institute (Mark Scanlon), OECD (Marie-Ange Baucher), Federchimica (Alessandra Pellegrini), CCPS (Shakeel and Willi Meier), AIChE (Trish Kern).

EPSC Website
The EPSC website was updated with all new materials in a well-organized way and continued to be a frequent visited website.

EPSC Newsletters
The Newsletters informed members and relations quarterly of all activities. Also an overview of relevant large incidents is provided.

---

2021

The EPSC Highlights 2021 are:

Members
EPSC membership did grow for the 5th consecutive year (with 10% on membership revenue). No asset owner stopped their EPSC membership in 2021. The following members joined EPSC in 2021: ADM, AkzoNobel, DNV, IFF, Sphera, Tecnimont and TNO.

Conferences
The 6th Big Data & Digital Conference was organized together with CCPS, as a virtual well attended congress. In 2022 we look forward to a face to face event on October 11 & 12.
The 2nd European Conference on Plant & Process Safety in Antwerp is well prepared, with a strong program including 40 presentations and a network forum with over 15 solution providers. The event is moved to March 8 & 9 as current Corona peak does not allow people to participate.

Webinars
To continue interaction, the following virtual meetings were organized:

• EPSC Sponsored Webinar series had 6 interesting presentations from solution providers for which typically more than 300 people registered. Topics: DEKRA - "Are you lucky or good? How Organisational Process Safety protects lives and livelihoods", DNV - Domestic and Industrial Hydrogen: Relevant Phenomena for Safety, Sphera - Visualize and manage process safety risk in operations: practical case studies, PPCL - Scientifically Connecting Alarm Limits and Operating Envelopes, Antea Group - Process Safety Aspects of Ammonia in the Energy Transition and Bilfinger Tebodin - Hazopposaurus Rex - The extinction of the group facilitated HAZOP sessions?
• The spring virtual EPSC Technical Meeting and fall hybrid Technical Meeting had an interesting program with good presentations and discussions. The minutes and presentations are available in the members only area on this website.
• Digitalization Working Group organized webinar sessions on the following topics: Dynamic Risk tools, Web-based systems to perform HAZOP, Drones for Inspection, Pitfalls of Digitalization, Alarm Management, Future Operations and Ground robots for hazardous operations. All presentations are available here.
• The CHEF/RAST Users Group had 6 users group meetings where cases were discussed, users experiences shared and understanding of the tool and formulas used enhanced. The group that got a more global character is accessible for all that downloaded the tool and followed the introduction course, that was again provided free of charge to all EPSC members.

EPSC Learning Sheets
The monthly 2021 EPSC learning sheets were related to the Process Safety Fundamentals. The sheets have a great value for operational sites and the number of users was doubled again as the distribution list includes over 2500 safety specialists and it is now available in 17 languages.

Working Groups Progression
Active Working Groups created advanced understanding in good discussions and some useful documents:

• Process Safety Fundamentals results and slides are now translated into German, Dutch, Swedish, Chinese and French. The number of companies that start to implement the PSF is still growing.
• PHA Efficiency: Hazops studies can be a time-consuming costly process. Best practices to enhance both quality and efficiency of PHA studies are being developed in this working group. In 5 sub-streams the work has been intensified.
• Leadership in Process Safety: Leadership and Culture are essential elements for process safety. While general documents are available, the inspired team is defining practical best practices to help companies to develop strong process safety leadership. A leadership workshop is in development together with consultant Peter Neil.
• Process Safety in Pharma and Consumer Industries produced a paper on the typical hazards and best practices of specific pharma unit operations (available in the members only area).
• Digitalization team had 7 well visited webinars where asset owners and solution providers presented on a specific digitalization aspect. All presentations are available here.
• Unwanted Polymerization is a well-known hazard that can cause process safety incidents. Especially chemicals with double bonds like iso-butadiene, propylene and styrene monomer. A charter and a working group have been set up to define the operational best practices to avoid this.
• Ageing of Glass Reinforced plastics Working Group is defined. While inspection for metal pressure vessels is outlined well, the ageing mechanism of GRP equipment and its inspection methods are less well defined. Best practices will be benchmarked, discussed and defined.

EPSC Benchmark Study
EPSC executed for the 4th year a benchmark study on process safety incidents (available in the members only area). Incident rates and root causes of the participating companies were made available anonymously in an easy overview. It is the largest and best documented benchmark studies available including over a billion manhours. With each additional year of this study the trend in process safety performance becomes more clear.

Relations
EPSC continued to strengthen interaction with related associations including CEFIC (Jean Godts), FABIG (Guillaume Vannier), Seveso Expert Group (Aneta Willems), VCI (Thilo Hoechst), DECHEMA and Process-Net (Alexander Frey), EFCE and Loss Prevention (Bruno Fabiano), Safety Delta Netherlands (Arjan van Dijk), Essenscia (Geert Boogaerts), GESIP (Frederic Pavard), Chemical Industry Association (Phil Scott), Phosgene working group (Kurt Meurer), IE-net (Frank Verschuren), Eurochlor (Ton Manders), Energy Institute (Mark Scanlon), OECD (Marie-Ange Baucher), CCPS (Shakeel Kadri), AIChE (Trish Kern).

EPSC Website
The www.EPSC.be website was further upgraded to show all events, technical documents and presentations in an easy accessible way.

---

2020

The EPSC 2020 highlights are:

Webinars
To continue interaction, the following virtual meetings were organized:

• EPSC started its Sponsored Webinar series where solution providers have been invited to present relevant topics: Baker Risk - Occupied Building Risk Assessments, Tuev Sued - Risk Based Inspection, RHDHV - REACH & Seveso and BAM - Experimental testing to understand consequences. With between 75-125 participants per webinar this proves to be a good way of reaching a for the topic relevant audience in EPSC member companies.
• The spring and fall TSC virtual meetings were attended by a record number of participants. The minutes and good presentations are available for all members.
• Digitalization Working Group organized webinar sessions on the following topics: Digital Permit to work, Digital training tools, Internet of things, Advanced use of HAZOP & MOC database, Machine Learning & Digital Twins. All presentations are available at the EPSC website.
• Human Performance Working Group presented its final results in an open webinar; the recordings are available at the website.
• Process Safety Fundamentals Working Group completed their results in a nice booklet format.

EPSC Learning sheets
Learning from relevant aspects at incidents that involve hazardous chemicals remains essential to keep awareness and create in-depth understanding around the relevant aspects on how to avoid them. The Learning Sheets are now available in 14 languages and have a mailing list with over 1400 process safety specialists around the world.

Conferences
The Big Data & Digital Conference was organized with CCPS, for the 5th time; this edition as a virtual event with a record number of participants.

Working Groups Progression
Active Working Groups created advanced understanding in good discussions and some useful documents:

• Process Safety Fundamentals & Human Performance WG finalized their results.
• PHA Efficiency: Hazops studies can be a time consuming costly process. Best practices to enhance both quality and efficiency of PHA studies are being developed in this working group with about 25 members.
• Leadership in Process Safety: Leadership and Culture are essential element for process safety as confirmed again after the TCR (2005) incident investigation. While general documents are available, the inspired team is defining practical best practices to help companies to develop strong process safety leadership.
• Process Safety in Pharma and Consumer Industries produced a brochure on Best Practices & Pitfalls in Electrostatics, and is working under inspired leadership of GSK to produce a best practice guide on key process safety aspects of typical pharma unit operations.
• The Digitalization Working Group defined their key topics and had 7 well visited webinars (topics mentioned before).
• RAST and CHEF Users Group shared cases on the tools that allow fast analysis of consequences of chemical releases. The underlying engineering Fundamentals were explained in a 10-session webinar with world-class trainers, and made freely available by EPSC to all employees of EPSC members. Over 120 persons from EPSC member companies attended this course.

EPSC Benchmark study
EPSC executed this year again the benchmark study on process safety incidents. Incident rates and root causes of the participating companies were made available anonymously in an easy overview. It is one of the largest benchmark studies (in terms of total working hours covered) available and with each additional year becoming more relevant as a trend benchmark for process safety performance.

EPSC Website
The www.EPSC.be website was further upgraded to show all events, technical documents and presentations in an easy way.

Circular Economy and Energy Transition and their process safety implications will become a new focus topic for 2021. EPSC seeks cooperation with other organizations that are involved in developing insights in the potential safety implications of new technologies in these fields, for example to continue to work together with FABIG.

---

2019

The EPSC 2019 highlights are:

First European Conference on Plant & Process Safety

With 225 enthusiastic participants and 20 recognised speakers from industry, this first EPSC conference was a great success! The event is planned to be repeated in Antwerp on Dec 9&10 2020. Presentations are available at the conference website.

EPSC Learning sheets

Learning from relevant aspects at incidents that involve hazardous chemicals remains essential to keep awareness and create in-depth understanding around the best practices. 10 of these sheets have been made available for sharing and discussing. The sheets are now made available in: English, German, Spanish, Italian, French and Dutch. Everybody can subscribe to receive the EPSC Learning sheets that is done by over 600 (in the first 6 months that it is available).

Working with FABIG

FABIG has developed in-depth understanding of fire and explosion behavior and the relevant safety measures. EPSC benefited from this knowledge during the FABIG contributions at the TSC and by participating in the FABIG meeting of Dec 16 in London, also made available by webinar. The plan is to continue working together and learning from each other.

Developments on early gas detection

Total hosted a meeting on their TADI R&D facilities in Pau, where practical tests are done on early gas detection. The open sharing with EPSC members and working together on the topic is well received and offers great potential.

TSC, Technical Steering Committee meetings

The spring & autumn meetings were hosted by respectively LyondellBasell (Wesseling) and DSM (Delft). Structured program with good topics and discussions. The presentations are made available at the EPSC website, members part.

Working Groups Progression

Active Working Groups realised again some nice and useful work and documents:

• Human Performance: a slide deck with practical tools was made that helps to avoid that operators, technicians and contractors make mistakes that involve chemical releases.
• Process Safety in Pharma and Consumer Industries produced (besides the many good discussions) a new brochure on Best Practices & Pitfalls in Electrostatics (available at the EPSC website, members part).
• Process Safey Fundamentals defined a set of 15 useful operational principles that needs attention to avoid chemical releases. This package has great potential to strengthen these principles and further reduce process safety incidents.
• The Digitalization Working Group defined their key topics and started to built useful practical information on the topic.
• RAST is a high potential tool to fast screen consequences in hazard studies. The users of the tool actively worked together to increase the understanding of the tool and to share experience. Ken First facilitated three webinars on the topic to help the users on this.
• Suggestions for new Working Groups were listed.

EPSC Benchmark study

EPSC made available the (largest) study on statistics on process safety incidents, comparing in an anonymous way the process safety performance of the companies that liked to join.

EPSC Website

The www.EPSC.be website was well maintained containing many good technical documents and presentations. Website use is growing year after year and reaches now a 1000 visits per month.

---

2018

The EPSC 2018 highlights are:

• A new 6 member Board was installed, completing the EPSC road to independency
• Spring Technical Meeting at DuPont in Dordrecht with special topics like Cyber Security, Virtual Reality and Approach for large toxic releases
• Monthly EPSC Learning Sheets, available in English, German & French, stimulating awareness and knowledge
• ACHEMA participation with an EPSC stand and a scientific session that provided an experimental explosion demonstration
• The Working Group on Process Safety in Pharma and Consumer Industries produced a paper on the approach for avoiding dust explosion in flued bed dryers
• Awarding the EPSC Process Safety Award to Dr. Hans-Peter Schildberg
• Paper on LOPA and Risk Matrix benchmark study by the Working Group on Semi Quantitative Risk Analysis
• EPSC Benchmark study comparing process safety incident statistics among European hazardous production facilities
• EPSC was able to welcome several new members (realizing a growth of about 20%)
• 3d Big Data and Digitalization Conference was organised together with CCPS, many practical cases were discussed (presentations on website)
• Website was renewed and modernised and continuously updated with all new information
• Sound financial management
• Fall Technical Meeting at BASF in Ludwigshafen, proposal for two new Working Groups on Process Safety Fundamentals and on Digitalization advantages for process safety
• Human Performance and Hazards of Loading and Unloading Working Groups had good progress meetings and defined best practices
• RAST software and manual made available and the RAST users group had two meetings with a group of technical safety specialists
• Establishing a plan to organize a European Conference on Plant & Process Safety

---

2017

Established since 1992, EPSC continues to be the ultimate process safety network for the process industries. 2017 has been a special year for EPSC – not only was it our 25th anniversary but also the year in which EPSC reorganized to a fully independent entity registered in Brussels and run exclusively by its membership for its members.

EPSC will continue to promote the sharing of best practice in process safety as well as run an innovative technical program. Twice yearly technical steering committee meetings give all full members access to the industry's top experts and managers in the field in a relaxed but strictly confidential environment. Subjects of particular importance and relevance will continue to be developed in working groups to which all members can freely participate.

In the coming years, EPSC will continue to play the role of expertise reference point for the EU concerning the development of process safety related guidelines and regulations. Carefully selected participation in the most relevant public events and conferences will also continue to assure the sector's most important process safety topics are on the agenda.

The EPSC remains an organization run on a lean & highly cost-effective basis resulting in modest fees that represent excellent value for money. We hope to be able to welcome you to our 2018 program. Please find below some highlights of current activities.

Technical Steering Team meetings. Held twice yearly, normally at members' facilities. The ultimate process safety technical event, with top level presentations and providing a unique opportunity to share experience across sectors. The spring 2017 TSC was held at Centrica in London, and the autumn 2017 TSC at Johnson & Johnson in Belgium.

A variety of working groups are always up and running on key topics. Do you miss your most important process safety topic? We invite you to put it on our agenda!

• Pharma: Active networking meetings, best practice on spray drying with more in the pipeline
• Semi Quantitative Risk Analysis: active networking meetings, benchmarking risk matrix and LOPA practice, best practices in development
• Loading-Unloading: an almost forgotten area of process safety getting the attention it needs
• RAST: process safety innovation – EPSC works with partners on a unique, semi-automated risk assessment tool revolutionizing accuracy and consistency of risk assessments
• The Human Performance: members have indicated the need for best practices in this crucial area. Expertise is being gathered and shared in this new working group.

Learning from incidents using the new EPSC Learning Sheet initiative

• EPSC Learning sheet is a new initiative to stimulate awareness on process safety. For this, typical incidents are discussed in a way that operating units improve the understand on the industrial best practices to avoid such incidents.

Conferences

• Big Data conference at Dechema organized together with CCPS –process safety innovation.
• WCCE conference in Barcelona – two days of Process Safety workshops
• EPSC joined the Prague World Corrosion conference.

---