(101b) Benchmarking Safety Culture in Major Hazards Industries in the Rotterdam Area

Benchmarking safety culture in major hazards industries in the Rotterdam
area (Netherlands)

By Gerard I.J.M. Zwetsloot[1],
Robert A. Bezemer[2], TNO.

Introduction

Safety culture is increasingly recognized as an
important determinant of safety, complementary to technology and safety organization.
Safety culture is in itself a 'soft' notion that may have, however, ?hard'
safety implications. The relevance of safety culture was firstly addressed in
the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster (IAEA 1986) and the Piper Alpha
disaster in the North Sea (Cullen 1990). We define safety culture as the
attitudes, values, (implicit) assumptions, perceptions and practices with
regard to dealing with safety risks.

With respect to the safety organization and
technology, major hazard companies have to comply with rather detailed
legislation. In the European Union this concerns the so called ?Post Seveso
(III)' legislation. There are no legal requirements with respect to safety
culture, except for nuclear power plants. Safety culture is and remains
therefore a responsibility of the companies involved.

Several incidents in the Netherlands in companies
dealing with large quantities of chemicals got a lot of attention. It was
broadly recognized that the safety cultures in these cases were relatively poorly
developed. As a result there is a growing societal interest in the Netherlands
for early recognition of serious safety risks and poor safety cultures in order
to prevent future similar incidents. There is also ?societal pressure' on chemical
industries and government to take adequate preventive action.

Against this background, the regional
environmental inspectorate DCMR asked TNO in 2012 to assess the safety culture in
fourteen major hazard companies in four related sectors. The focus was on those
characteristics of safety culture that are relevant for environmental safety
and the management of major hazards.  

Research objectives

The two main objectives were:

?    To gain insight into the safety culture of 14
companies in four industrial sectors: refineries, (petro) chemical industry,
bulk storage (tank parks), and chemical warehousing and logistics;

·      To allow benchmarking of safety
culture between those sectors and between companies

Methodology

The "TNO Quick
Scan Safety Culture" was conducted in fourteen companies. The TNO Quick
Scan measures 14 dimensions of safety culture; nine dimensions are taken from
the Hearts & Minds methodology (which comprises 18 dimensions, Parker et al
2006) as that methodology is broadly used by the chemical industry. Five other
dimensions are included because the scientific literature and industrial
experience demonstrate that they are very relevant for process safety.

The method comprises the following three elements:

- Preparatory stage: assessment of historic
data about safety incidents, safety programs, and correspondence with the local
environmental safety authorities (including non-compliances and fines), based
on information from the inspectorate and the company.

- Two day assessment at the site, involving two
researchers. The assessment comprised a walk-through (observations) and a
series of interviews, at least with the plant manager, HSE manager, middle
managers and supervisors, operators from day and continuous shifts, personnel
of contractors, maintenance manager or personnel, and a member of the Works
Council. In each interview all dimensions of safety culture relevant for the
interviewee were addressed; this implies that with e.g. the plant manager and
the HSE manager all 14 dimensions were addressed, while in other interviews
only a selection of the dimensions was addressed.

- Analysis and reporting stage: the results of
the various companies were analyzed, benchmarked and integrated into one report.

A team of seven researchers, consisting of experienced
safety and psychosocial experts having a broad experience with safety culture
carried out the assessments. They were trained in advance to be prepared to deal
adequately with socially desirable responses of the interviewees, and to make
sure they would get insight into the real safety practices.

Checks and balances between different sources (triangulation
between observations, documents, interviews and between interviewers) is an
essential part of the methodology. For each company the TNO Quick Scan Safety
Culture was concluded by a final meeting in which the results were presented to
management and were discussed.

Findings

Scores

The safety culture
scores, which are the most important for benchmarking, show that the (petro)
chemical companies and the refineries all have a good or acceptable safety
culture. Whereas a score of 3.0 (a calculative safety culture) is regarded as
the minimum acceptable score for a major hazard company, several companies in bulk
storage and chemical warehousing/logistics score this minimum or even lower.

It is also possible
to identify which dimensions of process safety culture were well or poorly
developed in each company and in the four industrial sectors. Obviously, in the
sectors with a weaker safety culture, more dimensions of safety culture were
weak. In the (petro) chemical companies and the two refineries no weak
dimensions were found. However, for the bulk storage and the chemical
warehousing several weak dimensions were identified, while excellently-developed
dimensions in these sectors were scarce.

Consistency

In five of the 14
companies the score on each of the 14 dimensions as well as all interviews
indicated a good safety culture. The average culture score of these five
companies was 3.8. These companies can be regarded as frontrunners in the
development of safety culture.

Three other companies
also achieved an average 3.8 score, but in these organizations there were remarkable
inconsistencies between the various interviews, i.e. there seemed to be
subcultures or ambiguities in the safety culture. Unfortunately, within the
limited timeframe available for the Quick Scan, it was not possible to further
investigate these inconsistencies; as a result the good score of these three companies
is associated with greater uncertainties.

Of the remaining six
companies, one had a very consistent score of 3.0. Three other companies also
got an average score of 3.0, but in these cases the consistency among the dimensions
and interviews was less. Finally, there were two companies with a score of no
more than 2.5. In these companies there was a range of weakly developed
dimensions of safety culture; there were complementary observations of some
specific unsafe practices as well.

In a few companies there
were observations of some specific unsafe practices. Again, we were not able to
further investigate this, which means that for these cases the safety culture scores
are associated with significant uncertainties.

In each company and each sector there were
opportunities for improving the safety culture. Three dimensions could be
improved in all four sectors: learning from incidents, dealing with audits and
reviews, and dealing with complexities.

Additionally, in the tank parks and the
chemical warehousing the management vision on accident causation as well the reporting
and analyses of incidents can also be improved.

In the chemical warehousing and logistics, three
other dimensions also require greater attention: safety leadership and
commitment, safety communication, and participation and commitment of employees.

Discussion

Limitations of this
research

The method used in this research was the TNO
Quick Scan Safety Culture. There are clearly limitations due to time
limitations of this method. Nevertheless, the method proved to be useful for
benchmarking purposes and for providing the companies with useful feedback on
the strengths and weaknesses of their safety culture.

Opportunities for
improvement

From several companies we got the feedback that
the benchmark provided them with valuable insights into specific issues in their
safety culture, which was used by management in their plans to (further)
improve their safety culture.