“Because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are.” — Bertolt Brecht
Of all the recent revisions to the EPA’s Risk Management Planning (RMP) rule, 40 CFR 68, the requirements around Safer Technology and Alternatives Analysis (STAA) have probably gotten the most attention. For those facilities covered by Program 3, which means facilities already covered by OSHA’s Process Safety Management (PSM) standard, 29 CFR 1910.119, the STAA requirements are in paragraph 68.67, Process Hazard Analysis.
(No, I’m not going to call them “stationary sources.” Even the EPA refers to them as “facilities” when it’s not writing regulations.)
Much of the handwringing about the STAA requirements seems to be less about what the regulations say, and more about what we fear it says. The truth is, most of us have been doing STAA without calling it that for years.
What is STAA?
STAA, or at least the EPA’s version of STAA, is the intentional application of the hierarchy of controls to risk reduction. The hierarchy is usually depicted as a pyramid. At the top of the pyramid are intrinsically safer technology and intrinsically safer design (IST/ISD). There are four approaches to IST/ISD:
- Substitution – replacing a chemical or process with a chemical or process with less risk
- Minimization – reducing the amount of hazardous chemical in a process so that its release has less impact
- Moderation – reducing the operating conditions (for example, pressure or temperature) so that a release from that process has less impact
- Simplification – reducing the complexity of a process so that there is less likely to be an error or failure that results in a release
There is nothing in the new EPA regulations or in the preamble to the new regulations that suggests that one of these approaches to IST/ISD is better than or preferable to another. So, if you are looking for any easy substitution to make, consider using propylene glycol instead of ethylene glycol as the antifreeze in your chiller loop.
The next layer down are passive measures. The EPA defines passive measures as risk management measures that reduce risk with human, mechanical or other energy input. In other words, they reduce risk by simply existing. A containment dike is a passive measure. So is a rupture disk. Or a check valve.
The layer below passive measures are active measures. These measures rely on energy input to detect process deviations and then to respond to them. Interlocks and safety instrumented functions are active measures, as is heat tracing to reduce the risk of frozen pipes.
At the bottom of the pyramid are procedural measures. These include any measure that depends on human action. The EPA specifically lists policies, operating procedures, training, administrative controls, and emergency response actions. To that, we should add PPE.
The irony, of course, is that the EPA has implicitly granted the general philosophical approach embodied in the hierarchy of controls a quantitative status. In the instance where the EPA actually requires implementation of safer technology or alternatives, it requires “at least one passive measure, or an inherently safer technology or design, or a combination of active and procedural measures equivalent to or greater than the risk reduction of a passive measure.” It’s as though the EPA believes that all passive measures are equal in risk reduction, and that any passive measure is better than any active measure. But a check valve is a passive measure and a SIL 3 SIF is an active measure, and no one who understands process risk reduction would choose to use a check valve instead of a SIL 3 SIF.
It’s Just Going to Take a Little Bit Longer
The requirements for STAA do not apply to every process covered by RMP. They only apply to processes in NAICS codes 324 (petroleum and coal products manufacturing) and 325 (chemical manufacturing). According to the preamble, there are 11,740 facilities covered by RMP; of those, 1,658 will have obligations to address STAA.
What do these 1,658 facilities have to do to address STAA? For most of them, they need to evaluate safer technologies and alternatives—the hierarchy of controls. This doesn’t mean an evaluation separate from a PHA. The EPA is quite comfortable that STAA “can be incorporated in the existing PHAs by using HazOps, What-If?, Checklists, a combination of these, or other appropriate equivalent methodologies.”
Recommendations are routinely generated during a PHA. We are starting to add a parenthetical comment at the beginning of each recommendation at the time it is developed, identifying whether the recommendation qualifies as “substitution,” “minimization,” “moderation,” “simplification,” “passive,” “active,” or “procedural.” Then, once we generate the list of recommendations, we can easily sort by type of safer technology and alternative. This obviously will take a little more effort, but the additional effort is trivial.
As for the fear that STAA requires implementing novel processes, the EPA came right out and said that it “does not expect facility owners or operators to research and create new processes or conduct research into all possibilities for the use of new chemicals. Instead, the STAA should focus on the industry known and existing substitute processes and chemicals that have been demonstrated to be safe in commercial use.”
But What About Implementing These Recommendations?
For most facilities, there is no requirement to implement any particular recommendation. There has always been a requirement to “promptly address the [PHA] team’s findings and recommendations” and to “assure that recommendations are resolved in a timely manner and that the resolution is documented.” This isn’t new. But “resolve” doesn’t necessarily mean “implement.”
There is a requirement, however, to implement at least some safer technology or alternatives at some facilities.
What facilities?
- Facilities in NAICS codes 324 and 325 that are within a mile of the fence line of another facility with a covered process in NAICS codes 324 and 325.
- Facilities in NAICS code 324 with a hydrofluoric acid alkylation process that is covered by RMP.
- Facilities in NAICS codes 324 and 325 with one or more accidents that have to be reported in their RMP accident history since their last PHA. (Not in the last five years, as some commentators insist, but since their most recent PHA.]
And what do they have to implement?
At least one passive measure OR an inherently safer technology or design OR a combination of active and procedural measures equivalent to or greater than the risk reduction of a passive measure.
Honestly, how hard is it to come up with one, or possibly two, new risk reduction measures that satisfy this requirement? Demolishing piping that was previously abandoned in place, for instance, is a form of simplification.
A New Order of Things
Machiavelli said something in his book, The Prince, that always comes to mind when discussing the opposition to a proposed change: “There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. For the innovator has enemies in all who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order.”
Being opposed to STAA is just a gut reaction, a fear of the new. For most facilities, formalizing STAA won’t change anything except for adding little bit to the documentation. A very little bit. Wonderfully, though, thinking about reducing the risk of process hazards by considering the hierarchy of controls is likely to improve safety.
Why be opposed to that?
The STAA Requirements Are Not Really Demanding Much
This effort to make the case that the EPA’s new STAA requirements for PHA’s are not really very demanding, shouldn’t be seen as encouragement to do the minimum required by the new rules. This approach to addressing hazards—and every process has them, no matter how many times it has been examined in the past—by considering risk reduction measures in terms of the hierarchy of controls should not be limited to doing the minimum. There will be lots of opportunities to improve, and we will all benefit from pursuing everything that is practicable.
So, let’s stop fretting and get on with it.
