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The Development of Process and Plant Safety in Germany during the Past Thirty Years
Author(s) -
Pilz V.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
chemical engineering and technology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.403
H-Index - 81
eISSN - 1521-4125
pISSN - 0930-7516
DOI - 10.1002/ceat.200800549
Subject(s) - process (computing) , hazard , scale (ratio) , microelectronics , engineering , hazard analysis , manufacturing engineering , risk analysis (engineering) , fault (geology) , process plant , systems engineering , computer science , reliability engineering , electrical engineering , business , chemistry , physics , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics , seismology , geology , operating system
The past thirty years have been a time of tremendous technical change. The development of microelectronics, in particular, has created a veritable revolution with regard to the possibilities of process control, as intelligent sensors and computers can provide information that was not available before. This, of course, has influenced safety technology. New tools, many of them computer aided, have allowed more precision in the design of plants and thorough fault analyses to be performed. Improved measuring units and more reliable scale‐up methods have opened the way for precise transfer of characteristic safety data towards the conditions of a large chemical plant. With such knowledge on hand, further steps towards inherent safety, that is reduced and minimized hazard potential, can be taken.