Recorded presentation

Jerry Poje, PhD, U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, 2175 K St, Suite 650, Washington, DC 20037, (202) 261-7617, poje@csb.gov

Uncontrolled chemical reactions continue to cause explosions, fires, and toxic emissions that kill and injure, damage property and threaten the environment. In December 1984 a runaway reaction within a storage tank at Bhopal, India’s Union Carbide pesticide plant released a toxic gas cloud that killed over 6000 and injured hundreds of thousands. Underlying management system failures at the Bhopal facility have been replicated in subsequent catastrophes, highlighting inherently safer design as an underutilized prevention tool. Technological disasters also initiate major policy changes that define process safety and strengthen public oversight. Two decades of chemical safety policy developments are described, including work of the United States Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), an independent agency created by Congress to investigate chemical disasters. CSB’s mission is to promote prevention of chemical incidents in commercial or industrial settings. CSB investigated the causes of domestic reactive hazard incidents, culminating in a major study of management practices and policy. CSB examined 167 serious incidents involving uncontrolled chemical reactivity over two decades. Forty-eight incidents resulted in a total of 108 fatalities, with nearly 50 incidents affecting the public. The Board’s recommendations to OSHA and EPA to strengthen process safety regulations have generated a broard array of initiatives in the environmental and labor communities to encourage federal and local governments as well as private industry to take decisive action to prevent future reactive chemical catastrophes. The Board’s major study of recent reactive incidents and its recommendations are reviewed and opportunities for public health improvements are discussed.

Learning Objectives:

• 1. Understand investigations and the underlying causes of major chemical catastrophes.
• 2. Articulate the value and need for inherently safer production of chemicals.
• 3. Identify gaps in current policies particularly with reactive chemical hazards and strategies to fill the gaps.

Keywords: Safety, Prevention

Related Web page: www.csb.gov

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.

Recorded presentation