Performance-based standards for process industry - Development, implementation and integration

Performance-based standards and regulations are being developed and implemented to manage industrial safety. Highlighted in this paper are the principles of performance-based standards, why and how they came into existence, their benefits over prescriptive standards and the issues in developing these standards. With this background, the performance based requirements provided by some of the national and international regulations and standards applicable to the process industry safety such as OSHA PSM standard, EPA's RMP rule, IEC and ISA standards on safety instrumented systems, and Seveso Directive are reviewed. In turn, the risk assessment approaches followed by the process industry to comply with these performance-based standards and regulations are outlined. Finally, an integrated approach is presented to comply with provisions of these performance-based standards and regulations in a practical and cost effective manner.