If You Can't Measure It, You Can't Control It: ProSmart Process Safety Management

摘要

The purpose of ProSmart is to help companies identify and use qualitative and quantitative indicators of the performance of PSM Systems to aid in continuous improvement. Continuous improvement is the hallmark of any quality program and should be a goal for companies interested in managing the risk of hazardous chemical operations. Continuous improvement for PSM systems is used to mean the incremental increase in the performance of the PSM system with no significant increase in resources, or the incremental increase in the cost-effec- tiveness of existing PSM activities resulting in equivalent or better PSM performance. The following are some of the benefits for companies that utilize ProSmart for continuous improvement of PSM: 1. Reduce risk of catastrophic accidents. 2. Improve cost-effectiveness of PSM activities. 3. Benchmark against PSM performance expectations. 4. Justify that PSM resources have been well spent. 5. Help establish priorities for PSM improvements. Lord Kelvin, the nineteenth-century English physicist who discovered the vital pillar of science known as the second law of thermodynamics, put it this way: When you can measure what you are speaking about and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meager and unsatisfactory kind.