APPLYING INHERENTLY SAFER CONCEPTS TO A PHOSGENE PLANT ACQUISITION

During the 1980's Dow Chemical acquired a urethanes business in Europe consisting of two major installations. These plants were of immediate concern due to large scale production and use of phosgene at one of t he sites. Even though Dow has considerable experience in the handling of chlorine, they had limited experience with phosgene in Europe. Afte r the impact of the acquisition was assessed, a high-level transition team was appointed by the Vice President of Manufacturing in Europe to evaluate and manage risk factors in the acquired units. Safety in man ufacturing was the first item on their agenda. In many cases the activ ities of the transition team were driven by the principles of Inherent ly Safer Process Design (Substitute, Minimize or Intensify, Moderate o r Attenuate and finally Simplify). The net effect of the work done sin ce acquisition is that risk exposure to the public in the adjacent vil lage has been considerably reduced. In addition, fugitive emissions of toxic materials have been eliminated. Economic evaluation since the p rojects were enacted has demonstrated that many of the activities coul d have been justified purely on the basis of return on investment.