Planning and Preparedness for Industrial Chemical Incidents

A chemical accident can have lethal effects on industry, society, or the environment. The best and most effective way to reduce the negative effects of a chemical accident is a timely and correct response to the accident. Since the probability of chemical accidents occurring cannot be reduced to zero, it is therefore necessary, through planning and suitable preparations, to minimize chemical accidents or to control them effectively. Emergency-situation planning is related to the design, arrangement, and maintenance of the emergency-response infrastructure and leads to the production of plans, executive procedures, guidelines, and information related to accident management. Preparedness for emergency situations is also the result of implementing emergency plans for foreseen hazards. From the middle of the twentieth century, chemicals found their role in the advancement of the economy and the welfare of society. At present, more than 15 million dangerous chemical substances are commercially available, and about 60 to 70 thousand of these substances are used on a daily basis. These substances have become a part of modern human life, and with this remarkable growth in the production and transport of dangerous materials, an increase in chemical accidents is not unexpected. A review of the history of chemical accidents shows that some chemical accidents have occurred in unexpected places. Therefore, in the classification of chemical accidents, definitions have been considered, as follows: 1- Catastrophe The highest level of severity of chemical accidents, in which a very wide area is affected, such that control of the chemical accident is beyond the capacity of local and governmental authorities and institutions. This category of accidents is very rare. 2- Disaster A situation in which a large number of people are exposed to harmful chemical agents, and these exposures can cause a serious and widespread threat to the lives of people and to physical and social assets. A disastrous situation goes beyond the control of the organization that caused that situation and requires the help and measures of external governmental institutions and centers. 3- Emergency A situation that, if not controlled, will become disastrous. In an emergency situation, swift and critical measures are needed, and if effective measures to control the accident are not taken, a disaster will occur. A chemical emergency situation has characteristics such as the potential for the consequences to spread and the need for immediate control. 4- Incident A situation in which people are potentially exposed to harmful chemical hazards. In this situation, concerns may arise at the level of society, and the released materials may have the potential to cause immediate or delayed harm to people's health. If not controlled, chemical incidents can turn into emergency situations. The mechanism by which chemical accidents occur A chemical accident is always accompanied by the outflow of a dangerous substance from a container. The outflow of a substance from a container can occur for any reason (technical reasons, human error, environmental causes, chain accidents, sabotage, etc.). The most common causes of the outflow of process materials from controlled conditions are managerial and technical defects and errors. Fundamentally, preventive measures such as Process Safety Management (PSM) are designed with the aim of preventing the unwanted outflow of materials from processes. After the outflow of a dangerous substance from controlled conditions, depending on the influential external and internal factors, various scenarios are likely. These scenarios are classified into three general categories: fire, explosion, and the release of a toxic substance. The cycle of managing emergency situations and major accidents The chemical-accident management cycle forms a continuous process through which industries, the government, and urban communities take joint measures to reduce the possible effects of chemical accidents. The nature of the activities that must be carried out to reduce the possible consequences of chemical disasters depends on the stages of this cycle. In the book Chemical Accident Management, by Hak Publications, these stages are explained completely and comprehensively. Some chemical-accident scenarios are detected automatically because of their disastrous effects and the impacts they have on the population. Nevertheless, most chemical accidents are small to medium accidents that affect a small number of people. In most accidents of this kind, the occurrence of chemical accidents is not reported by the accident-causing industry to the competent authorities. This failure may be the result of the company's assumption that the accident is small and that it can control the accident on its own and that there is no need to report to other centers. Nevertheless, in many cases, the accident-causing industry does not have correct knowledge and information about how to assess the effects of the chemical accident and has not been able to correctly estimate the potential risks of the accident that occurred. Other reasons, such as fear of a bad reputation, fear of legal penalties, indifference to the law, etc., can also cause chemical accidents to go unreported. A chemical accident can have short-term or long-term effects on the health of responders and the community. Therefore, all chemical accidents differ depending on whether they are acute or chronic. You, dear readers, can, by obtaining the book "Management of Industrial Chemical Accidents" written by Mr. Omid Kalatpour, engineer, from Hak Publications, receive complete and comprehensive information about the diagnostic mechanisms of both groups.