Application of Hazard and Operability Study (HAZOP) in Evaluation of Health, Safety and Environmental (HSE) Hazards (Case Study: Oil Storage of National Iranian Oil Products Distribution Company)

An extensive hazard identification of petroleum industries as part of a sound safety analysis is not only highly recommendable but often subject to official approval of construction by the national governmental authorities. Risk assessment and management techniques are used in industrial activities to diminish accident potential by the application of prevention or protection techniques to improve process safety.This project aims at introducing a preventive approach to process hazard identification andidentifying, evaluating and control of Health, Safety and Environmental hazards in studied unit. For this purpose, Hazard and Operability Study (HAZOP) have been applied to an oil storage and process unit in Hamadan. The HAZOP is the most widely used of the various analysis techniques available, in part because this highly structured technique is easy to teach and well-suited for petroleum industry.1180 hazards identified by completing the study. The results of research showed that 38.136% of identified hazard were unacceptable. The root cause of 31.35% was unsafe behaviors. Considering to catastrophic consequences of probabilistic accidents, the results emphasize on control of unacceptable hazards and recommends installing pressure switch and flow switch on the product receiving lines and conducting of regular and periodic HSE auditing plans.