ABSTRACT
The purpose of safety engineering is to ensure that engineered systems are safe to use. The field of system safety engineering is closely related to industrial engineering and systems engineering and is considered a subset of system engineering. This chapter discusses several aspects of safety design, such as hazard identification and study, risk assessment, plant layout, emergency shutdown, fire protection and firefighting, fire and gas detection, hazardous area classification, and escape and evacuation. Also covered in this chapter are various safety standards used worldwide, including the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), American Petroleum Standard (API), International Organization for Standardization (ISO), International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), and Norwegian petroleum standards (NORSOK). The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), which is responsible for protecting worker health and safety in the United States, is briefly discussed in addition to the above standards.
