Since 1987 – Safety Consultancy

Layout Risk Assessment

Eidos develops Layout Risk Assessment (LRA) for project ranging from single/group of equipment to a brand new site. LRA on existing plants/sites is usually focused on building and control rooms because a complete Safety review and a Consequence analysis are already available to study the “Domino effects”.

Eidos develops LRA at the following “typical” stages of the layout design development:

  • First stage: Conceptual or Proposed or Front End Layout
  • Second stage: Secondary or Intermediate or Sanction Layout
  • Third stage: Final Layout

The LRA prepared during the First stage is usually carried on using “safe separation distances” or “ranking” methods because in this phase all the information needed are not available to prepare the complete study based on Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA or Safety review).

The LRA prepared during the Second stage is usually developed referencing the QRA analysis because at this stage the Safety review is available (and, in the countries where it is requested, also approved by the authorities). In this phase the LRA is fully quantitative and based on the actual top-events).

The LRA during the first two stages is “engineering oriented” where the goal will be to identify and evaluate quantitatively the impact of any modification to the LRA of the designed system. In this way, by working jointly with the design team, Eidos will supply a list of improvements evaluated singularly.

Carefully planning the LRA leads to reduced requirements on firefighting and fireproofing resources and equipments with huge savings on the plant or site construction and operation for your customer.

The LRA prepared on the third stage is based on the “as built” Safety review developed and is usually an attachment of that study. This LRA has to confirm the assumption made early and, where applicable, the permit granted by the authorities.

On the subject of evaluating building and control rooms vulnerability please also refer to Industrial Safety.

On the subject of optimizing the layout in order to guarantee the “off-the-fence” Land Use Compatibility (LUC) please refer to LUC.

All the studies will be based on international standards like:

  • Process Industry Practice PNE00003 “Process Units and Offsite Layout Guide”, edition June  2013
  • API RP752 “Management of Hazards Associated with Location of Process Plant Permanent Buildings”, third edition 2009
  • API RP753 “Management of Hazards Associated with Location of Process Plant Portable Buildings”, first edition 2007
  • API RP2001 “Fire protection in Refineries”, 9th edition 2012
  • API Std 2510 “Design and Construction of Liquefied Petroleum Gas Installations” edition 2001
  • API Pub 2510A “Fire Protection Considerations for the Design and Operation of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) Storage Facilities”, 2nd edition 1996, reaffirmed Dec 2010
  • API Std 620 “Design and Construction of Large, Welded, Low-Pressure Storage Tanks”, 12th edition, October 2013
  • NFPA 30 “Flammable and Combustible Liquids Code”, Edition 2015
  • NFPA 58 “Liquefied petroleum gas code”, Edition 2017
  • Chemical industries Association UK (CIA) “Guidance for the location and design of occupied buildings on chemical manufacturing sites”, third edition 2010
  • AIChE Center for Process Safety (CCPS) “Guidelines for Evaluating Process Plant Buildings for External Explosions, Fires, and Toxic Releases” 2nd Edition, April 2012