(32x) Where Is Process Safety in the SDGs?

In 2015, the United Nations developed the Sustainable Development Goals. They were a clear action plan for the future to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. While the 17 goals cover a range of areas, from eradicating poverty to focusing on life on land and below water, and a several other areas, there was no clear goal that focused on process safety. However many of the goals cannot be achieved without process safety underpinning them. This is especially apparent when considering the goals that incorporate industry.

As the world progresses towards the energy transition, to meet the SDGs, process safety needs to be a core underpinning principle that is taken forward. This raises the question of how we incorporate process safety into the new energies. We are not seeing any new hazards, the underpinning physics and chemistry remains unchanged, but we are seeing new risks, as the hazards are presenting in new and different ways.

This paper will explore how to apply process safety thinking to the energy transition and address the SDGs in meaningful ways.