Nearly all industrial equipment safety standards require the OEMs conduct a risk assessment on each piece of equipment, therefore it is important to establish repeatable processes for conducting risk assessments.
A full risk assessment can identify where risk exists within equipment and within a facility, and then pinpoint the best people and technologies to use in order to minimise those risks. It also helps identify a piece of equipment's level of safety and establish an acceptable level of risk for each operation. Finally, it lays the framework for the overall risk reduction process, which involves the following steps:
- Help eliminate hazards by design, using inherently safe design concepts
- Employ safeguarding and protective measures with hard guarding and safety devices
- Implement complementary safety measures including personal protective equipment
- Help achieve safer working practice with procedures, training and supervision
OMEs are also required by international safety standards to identify and document potential hazards associated with equipment, and the risk levels the hazards present to users at all phases of the design process. This forces the designer to consider all the ways a piece of equipment's safety functions and applications interact with each other, including during regular operation, maintenance, and quality assurance tasks.
In addition, designers must consider many factors that could potentially create risk, such as temperature, humidity, voltage variations and noise. Previous standards only dictated the design of a control circuit in a safety system, leaving out many systems and functions that can help mitigate risk. The newer international safety standards make design engineers consider the entire system when reducing risk - improving operator and equipment safety, and often helping cost-justify an upgrade to a more effective safety solution.
Rockwell Automation Case Study
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