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PM Group saw a significant increase in the requirement for HAZOPs during the early stages of the Pandemic. In the first month alone, 50 remote sessions were chaired.

According to a new article in TCE (The Chemical Engineer), project teams are adapting to ensure good HAZOPs in a new remote working world and applying considerable levels of creativity and flexibility to achieve them. This is the view of lead process engineer, Conor Crowley who spoke to PM Group’s safety teams about how they are successfully managing HAZOPs remotely.

According to the article, “PM Group saw a huge increase in the requirement for HAZOPs during the pandemic. In the first month alone, 50 remote sessions were chaired. While this might seem due to increased vaccines and treatment development in the pharmaceutical sector, the increase was more due to the sudden availability of operators, subject matter experts and vendors who in normal circumstances would be on site, on a plane or otherwise in demand. Once clients came to terms with the situation, it was really a case of what can we do to progress projects under the current circumstances?

Wrap-ups captured feedback

The majority of remote HAZOP sessions were reduced to no more than four hours actual HAZOP time per day to maximise the energy of the team, break times were agreed at the start of each session, and wrap-ups were conducted to capture feedback on what went well and what challenges were faced in conducting the HAZOP remotely. The lessons were then shared with colleagues. The consensus of PM Group HAZOP chairs was that while there is no substitute to getting key individuals in a room the remote solution was workable under these extraordinary circumstances. As with other sectors if the scope is a novel, unique or difficult technology then room is favoured over remote.”

 

Read the full article in TCE