Tick Tock, Tick Tock: Is It Time for a PHA Revalidation?

“Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping, into the future.”  — Steve Miller

The Process Safety Management (PSM) standard, 29 CFR 1910.119, states in (e)(6) that “At least every five (5) years after the completion of the initial process hazard analysis, the process hazard analysis shall be updated and revalidated by a team meeting the requirements in paragraph (e)(4) of this section, to assure that the process hazard analysis is consistent with the current process.”

It seems straightforward enough, but many have questions. OSHA addresses some of those questions in its letters of interpretation (Fellner, 22-Jan-1998; Worthington, 20-Sep-2019), but still, there are questions.

We’re going to answer some of those questions here.

First Of All, This Is Not Legal Advice

The questions that get posed to us are usually in the form of “Are we good if we…?” By “good”, we are going to assume “in compliance with the standard.” We are not going to try to anticipate how an OSHA inspector would respond, or if they would even care. Judging from the many citations we’ve reviewed, it seems that OSHA’s response to being out of compliance is going to depend on a lot of factors:

• What was it that prompted the inspector to show up in the first place?
• What is the workplace’s past history with OSHA?
• What is the experience and, let’s be honest, the mood of the inspector?

OSHA points out that “with our state partners, we have approximately 1,850 inspectors responsible for the health and safety of 130 million workers, employed at more than 8 million worksites around the nation.” Do the math and it becomes pretty obvious that at 70,000 workers per OSHA inspector and 4,300 workplaces per inspector, the probability of an inspector showing up at random are pretty low.  If they are at a workplace, something got their attention.

Nonetheless, let’s assume that an OSHA inspector has arrived and is interested in your PHA revalidation.

What Does OSHA Mean By Five Years?

Five years means 1,826 days. Or 1,827 days if the five-year span includes not one, but two leap years. It does not mean that if you did your last PHA sometime in 2020, that the revalidation needs to be done sometime in 2025.

When Does The Clock Start? When Does The Clock Stop?

The five-year clock starts when a PHA is complete. It stops, or rather, it resets to zero, when the next PHA or PHA revalidation is complete. It doesn’t start when the PHA begins, and it doesn’t stop when the next PHA begins.

What Does Completed Mean?

A PHA uses an appropriate methodology, for example, a HazOp or a What If/Checklist, and addresses the hazards of the process, previous incidents, engineering and administrative controls, consequences of failures (including effects on employee safety and health), facility siting, and human factors. Then document all of this. When the documentation of all this is prepared and issued, the PHA is completed.

Other tasks, like resolution of recommendations and pre-startup safety reviews, come after the PHA but are not part of the PHA.

What If The Process Is Not Covered By PSM For Part Of The Time?

The PSM standard only applies to covered processes. There are several reasons that a process might not be covered, even if it seems that it should be. Only two reasons, however, are variable:

1. If the process changes from exceeding the threshold quantity of a flammable or listed chemical to being less than the TQ, or vice versa.
2. If the process changes from being an occupied remote facility to being a normally unoccupied remote facility.

While a process is not covered (less than the TQ, being normally unoccupied), the standard does not require a PHA. While a process is covered, it must have a PHA that is less than 5 years old. The clock does not stop ticking. The PSM standard, which went into effect on May 26, 1992, gives this example: “Process hazards analyses completed after May 26, 1987, which meet the requirements of this paragraph are acceptable as initial process hazards analyses. These process hazard analyses shall be updated and revalidated, based on their completion date, in accordance with paragraph (e)(6) of this section.”

The standard doesn’t say anything about whether the process was covered during those five years. Just that if a process is covered at any moment, it must be less than five years since the PHA was completed at that moment. There is no time-out.

Does The PHA Revalidation Team Need To Be A Full PHA Team?

The interesting part of this question is the definition of “a full PHA team.” Some companies have internal requirements that call for up to a dozen people to be on a PHA team: process engineers, instrumentation engineers, maintenance mechanics, operators, EHS personnel, shift supervisors, I&E technicians, industrial hygienists, and more. That is not OSHA’s requirement.

OSHA requires a team (that means at least two people) “with expertise in engineering and process operations” and “at least one employee who has experience and knowledge to the process being evaluated.” Then, for good measure, OSHA requires that “one member of the team must be knowledgeable in the specific process hazard analysis methodology being used.” Given an expansive definition of “a full PHA team,” it is entirely possible for a PHA team to be something less than that. However, it must satisfy OSHA requirements for a team.

It is not in compliance for a revalidation to be performed by a single person, then presented to a group for sign-off.

How Often Do We Need To Do A PHA From Scratch?

A PHA revalidation typically starts with an existing PHA, then reviews it to affirm that it “is consistent with the current process.” If nothing has changed and the PHA team that worked on the initial PHA didn’t miss anything or make any mistakes, then the PHA shouldn’t change. But no PHA team is perfect, so things were missed and mistakes were made. And something always changes. That means the new PHA will be different.

It is customary to perform a PHA from scratch occasionally. We recommend that every other PHA be from scratch, meaning that once per decade, a team starts with a blank sheet of paper. Some organizations do this every third PHA.

OSHA doesn’t have any expectations in this regard. In CPL 02-01-065, OSHA instructs it inspectors that it does not intend “that an employer must conduct all new and completely redo PHAs on processes which have received initial PHAs.”

What If You Are Late?

These are not new answers to questions about PHA revalidation. They are answers to questions that have been asked many times and are still being asked. Perhaps the simplest thing to do is to start a revalidation with plenty of time to spare, in order to accommodate the events that inevitably upset schedules, and then manage the pacing of the PHA so it is finished just as the five-year deadline rolls around.

Simple doesn’t mean easy, though. The personnel responsible for managing compliance with the PSM standard have a lot to manage, and sometimes things slip. But as equestrian George Morris said, “If you fall off a horse, get back on.” If a PHA Revalidation is late, there is nothing to be done for it. It’s late. Just get on with it, determined to do better next time.