Components Of Hse Management
Health, protection and Environmental supervision should be part of the engineering profession in a country for the purpose of
o duty of care
o economic reasons and
o legal reasons.
Hse supervision should therefore consider five broad phases:
* Specifications
* Design and implementation
* Installation and commissioning
* Operation and maintenance
* Changes after commissioning.
* Compliance with the standards requires four significant elements:
* Identification of protection functions required for the safe shutdown
* Assignment of a protection integrity level (Sil) for each protection function
* Use of the protection lifecycle for the engineering invent and
* Verification of the Sil achieved for each protection function.
3.0 Engineering Code Of Practice
The engineering code of convention takes into notice the following:
* Public safety: Giving priority to the protection and well-being of the society and having regard to this principle in assessing obligations to the clients, employers and colleagues.
* Risk Management: Taking reasonable steps to minimize the risk of loss of lives, injuries or suffering.
* Workplace and building site: Minimizing inherent dangers complicated in the building and invent of engineering products and processes.
* Public/Community well-being
* Communication
* Conflicts of interest
* Confidentiality
The privilege of practicing engineering is entrusted to those distinguished and who have the responsibility for applying engineering skills, scientific knowledge and ingenuity for the advancement of human welfare and ability of life. Basal system of conduct of engineers consist of truth, honesty and trustworthiness in their assistance to the society, honourable and ethical convention showing fairness, courtesy and good faith towards clients, colleagues and others. Engineers take societal, cultural, economic, environmental and protection aspects into notice and strive for the efficient use of the world's resources to meet long term human needs.
4.0 Safe Engineering Designs
Safety is a concern in virtually all engineering invent processes. Engineers should understand protection in the context of engineering invent and what it means to say that a invent is safe against human injuries.
Current invent methods prioritize economic considerations over environmental ones. In some cases, economic considerations also serve environmental goals. For instance, the minimization of materials used in a structure means resources are saved. If they are saved at the expense of the distance of the operating life of a product, then, economic considerations disagreement with environmental interests which query that products be made as durable as inherent because of the need to minimize resource usage and waste generation in the long term.
Safety is the antonym of risk. So, a invent is safe to the extent that it reduces risk. Safe invent aims at minimizing risk in the accepted sense of this term.
A safe invent is the compound of all those procedures and system that are used by engineers to make designed objects safe against accidents foremost to human death or injuries, long term condition effects, damage to the environment or malfunctioning in general.
Several invent strategies used to accomplish protection in operations of potentially risky technology are:
* inherently safe design
* safety factors
* negative feedback (self-shutdown) and
* multiple independent protection barriers.
Probabilistic Risk evaluation (Pra) is the most coarse formula of assessing protection but safe designs are used to sell out risks in the accepted (probabilistic) sense but is inadequate. Safe invent strategies are used to sell out estimated probabilities of injuries or reducing uncertainties not only risks. They are used to cope with hazards and eventualities that cannot be assigned meaningful probabilities.
5.0 Design system In Engineering
There are four (4) main invent system in Engineering practice.
(a) Inherently safe design:
This minimizes the inherent dangers in the process as far as possible. inherent hazards are excluded rather than enclosed or coped with. For instance, risky substances are substituted by less risky ones and fire proof materials are used rather than inflammable ones.
(b) Safety Factors
Construction should be strong adequate to resist load and disturbances exceeding those that are intended. A coarse way to regain such protection reserves is to employ explicitly chosen numerical protection factors are employed. If a protection factor of two (2) is employed when building a bridge, then the bridge is calculated to resist twice the maximal load to which it will be exposed to in practice.
(c) Negative feedback mechanisms
This is introduced to accomplish a self-shutdown in case of device failure or when the operator looses control. Examples are protection valves that let out steam when the pressure is too high in a steam boiler and the dead man's hole that stops the train when the driver falls asleep. One of the most foremost protection measures in the nuclear commerce is to ensure that reactors close down automatically in significant situations.
(d) Multiple Independent protection Barriers
Safety barriers are arranged in chains, so that each wall is independent of its predecessors (if the first fails, the second is still intact). The first barriers preclude accidents; the second barriers limit the consequences of an emergency and recovery services as the last resort.
Safety factors and many protection barriers deal with uncertainties as well as risks. But currently, Probabilistic Risk diagnosis (Pra) is used but does not deal with uncertainties. Probabilistic calculations can maintain but will not supplant the Engineers' ethically responsible judgment (environment, condition and protection culture).
Safety engineering system also consist of instruction of operators, maintenance of tool and installations and incidence reporting are examples of protection practices of normal importance.
6.0 Health, protection & Environmental supervision In Engineering Practice
The Engineering profession is incredible to be the harbinger of Health, protection & Environmental supervision by virtue of the complexity of the production of the profession and their impacts on the lives of the normal populace. How have we carried this along in our expert practices?
Seven (7) bad engineering practices have been identified:
* Believing that if something is not specifically stated, either "shall do" or "shall not do" in the standards, an engineer does not need to worry about it.
* Thinking that meeting the minimum requirements means the process is safe and complies with the standard.
* Ignoring the importance of good engineering practice.
* Designing systems that meet economic requirements but not protection protection requirements.
* Neglecting human factors (errors in calculations etc)
* Focusing on capital cost and not on lifecycle costs.
* Focusing only on the protection integrity level (Sil) and not on prevention.
Safety is an significant ethical requirement in engineering practice. Strategies for safe invent are used not only to sell out estimated probabilities of injuries but also to cope with hazards and eventualities that cannot be assigned meaningful probabilities. Designers have an ethical responsibility to make constructions that are safe for future use. protection is implicated with avoiding positive classes of events that are morally right to avoid.
In engineering design, protection notice always includes protection against unintended human death or injuries that occur as a consequent of the unintended use of the designed object for:
* Prevention of damage to the environment
* Prevention of long term condition effects
For example, if a bridge collapses, the engineers who designed it are held responsible.
Building designers and builders must obey building protection in the use of Scaffolds, tool nets, tool boxes, mechanical lifts and hand-operated lifts under safe procedures, use of personal protective equipments (Ppes) on sites (boots/helmets), clear passages and road-ways, building tapes to cordon off work areas etc. Most engineers have neglected this aspect, thus, playing with the lives of the generality of the populace.
What engineers do have chronic influences on protection and define our level of Environment, condition and protection culture.
7.0 Ethical Obligations In Engineering Practice
Ethical obligations are significant in order for engineers to carry out their profession. Without the obligation of confidentiality, clients could not trust engineers with commercially sensitive information. Without these information, engineers could not do their jobs. The moral obligations of our profession can be understood as duties which are necessary.
There are five (5) Basal values significant for the ethical obligations:
* Protection of lives and safeguarding of people.
* Professionalism, integrity and competence
* Commitment to community/public well-being
* Sustainable supervision and care for the environment
* Sustaining engineering knowledge
8.0 Engineering convention Requirements
* Engineers shall hold predominant the Health, protection and Environment/welfare of the public in the convention of their profession.
* Engineers shall convention only in their areas or field of competence, in a just and diligent manner and in conformance with standards, laws, codes, rules and regulations applicable to engineering practice.
* Engineers shall witness the societal and environmental impact of their actions and projects, including the use and conservation of resources and power in order to make informed recommendations and decisions..
* Engineers should contend their interests clearly.
* Engineers shall sign and take responsibility for all engineering works which they prepared or directly supervised. Engineers may sign works prepared by others only with their consent and after adequate recapitulate and verification.
* Engineers shall act as just agents for their employers or clients and contend confidentiality, avoid conflicts of interest whenever inherent and disclose positive conflicts.
* Engineers expert concerns must be made known to the client and the consequences of engineering decisions or judgments.
* Engineers should reject any public works, engineering decisions or convention that endanger the Hse of the public.
* Engineers shall commit to life-long learning, strive to progress the body of engineering knowledge and should encourage other engineers to do likewise.
* Engineers shall promote responsibility, commitment and ethics both in the instruction and convention phases of engineering. They should enhance society's awareness of engineer's responsibilities to the public and encourage the communication of these system of ethical conduct among engineers.
9.0 Hse Sustainability supervision
This is about the long term survival of humanity. It recognizes that decisions made today must enable both those in the gift as well as population of the foreseeable future to make efficient choices about their ability of life.
Failure to recognize risks to protection and the inability to address or operate these risks can consequent in heavy costs, both human and economic. The multidisciplinary nature of protection engineering means that a very broad array of professionals are actively complicated in emergency arresting or protection engineering.
A significant fault endangers or few people. A catastrophic fault endangers, harms or kills a significant number of people. Engineer's errors or inability to combine the Hse supervision in his convention spells catastrophic.
10.0 The Way Forward
Everyone must progress his or her understanding of Hse awareness by development protection a priority. Also, cost efficient solutions in order to gain the biggest return on venture should be developed.
Engineers take early invent of a system, analyze it to find what faults can occur and then recommend protection requirements in invent specifications upfront and changes to existing systems to make the system safer.
If significant protection problems are discovered late in the invent process, correcting them can e very expensive. This type of error has the inherent to waste large sums of money.
* At all times, take all reasonable care to ensure that your work and the consequences of your work cause no unacceptable risk to safety.
* Take all reasonable steps to make your management/client and those to whom they have a duty of care aware of the risks you identify.
* Make whatever overruling or neglecting your expert advice formally aware of the consequent risks.
* It is significant for engineers to contend a deep and broad understanding of the many technical and expert convention issues that they will inevitably encounter in their role as employees of public owners. This is achieved straight through accepted education, training, experience, license, expert engineering convention and chronic expert development.
11.0 Conclusion
The engineering convention like the building commerce is the agent of public and economic development, the barometer of economic activities and a very large employer of labour in Nigeria. It accounts for over 60% of the total capital investment. It is the largest employer of labour (think of all the electrical, mechanical, civil, chemical and computer jobs in industries).
Health, protection and environment, which is implicated with life and asset must be taken serious in this profession. protection procedures are significant to preclude accidents, diseases and harmful effects on the condition of the public at large arising from the activities in the commerce on site and its environs or off site.
Good Hse supervision is visible in a country straight through the ability of the expert ethics of the professionals, engineers inclusive and the level of her condition values and the state of her environment, that is, her level of cleanliness (personal hygiene and public sanitation).
It can only be advanced straight through personal commitment, willingness and self-sacrifice because of the long and short run benefits therein. Hse supervision habit starts with protection consciousness. protection consciousness dwells with each and every one of us and should be taken along to our expert practices.
People should recognize that their condition and well-being are related to the ability of their environment and should apply thoughtful system to effort to enhance the ability of their environment.
As Engineers, we should lead others in being protection aware at all times and refraining from doing whatever that may consequent to accident. We should apply protection measures to all our daily activities and take our protection and that of others nearby us as our responsibilities especially in our practices.
Finally, as Engineers we should pursue sustainable Health, protection & environmental supervision and make it part and parcel of our engineering convention today for the prolonged relevance of our profession tomorrow. It is only when this is done that our expert ethics will be meaningful knowing fully well that the products of our expert practices have great impact on the lives of the whole citizens of this country.
Health, protection & Environmental supervision habit is therefore not only significant and but remains a vital ingredient of our expert ethics in engineering convention in Nigeria and elsewhere and this must be sustained always by all.
Health, safety & Environmental (Hse) supervision In Engineering institution