Hazard Identification

& Risk Assessment.

CONTENTS

Purpose of HIRA
Definition of Hazard.
Identify the Hazard.
Definition of Risk.
Why conduct a Risk Assessment ?
Factors involved in Risk Assessment.
Types of Risk Assessment.
- Quantitative.
- Qualitative.
Quantitative Risk Assessment.
- Event Tree Analysis.
Qualitative Risk Assessment.
- Risk Ratings.

Hazard Identification & Risk

Assessment

PURPOSE

To identify hazard linked to various activities and associated

risks.
To evaluate the risk of all activities & services.
To identify significant hazard and
To keep information up to date.

Definition

Hazard

Is a physical entity (i.e. an energy or an environmental

agent) which could produce injury or disease in people
(or environmental damage, damage to property, etc.).

Something that has the potential to cause harm!

HAZARDS CAN BE

To identify hazards we need to understand that hazards

can be:

Obvious.

Hidden.

Obvious Hazard

unguarded machinery
poor housekeeping
dust
noise
vibration
working at heights
load shifting equipment
chemicals

Hidden Hazards

Potential energies such as thermal, mechanical and electrical.

Psychological hazards such as stress, fatigue, lack of training,
bullying and harassment.
Biological hazards such as communicable diseases (blood
borne viruses)

Identify the hazard

Observation
walk around the workplace, use checklists as a guide, incident
and injury reporting mechanisms in place and most
importantly ensure staff are instructed on how to formally
document hazards.
Consultation
talk to shop floor staff, seek assistance from specialists and
other companies who complete similar tasks or who work in
the same industry.

Observation

Workplace Inspections
Workplace Inspections are a key process for identifying
hazards in the workplace and eliminating them before they
cause an accident or injury.

Types of inspection
Continuous (Hazard reports)
Periodic (Recurring audits /checklists)

Inspection checklists

A formal inspection checklist (s) that is specifically tailored to

operations and maintenance requirements of the organization
should be developed as follows:

Housekeeping
Plant, equipment and machinery
Work processes
Work arrangement (including shift work, overtime, stress
factors)
The physical environment (e.g. temperature, lighting, space,
noise)
Management systems (policies and procedures)

Consultation

Involves

Sharing information
Exchange of views between employers and their
representatives
Genuine opportunity
Contribute effectively to any decision-making process
Eliminate or control risks to health and safety

Consultation should occur when

Identifying hazards.
Assessing the risks.
Developing control measures.
Reviewing the effectiveness of control measures.
Planning changes to the work environment, plant, equipment,
work processes, work organization, work systems or
chemicals in use.

Definitions

RISK

The probability (likelihood) of harm or damage occurring from

exposure to a hazard, and the likely consequences of that harm
or damage.

A chance of something happening that will impact on your

objective.

Why conduct a risk assessment ?

Human factors save life, stop workplace injures,

illnesses and increase staff morale.

Legal factors meet legislative requirement and Work

Cover.

Financial factors decrease the risk of prosecution

and fines incurred, reduce absenteeism, increase
potential for gaining shareholders and increase
productivity.

To reduce any significant risk.

Responsibilities of Employer

Provide a safe working environment.

Provide safe systems of work.
Provide plant and substances in a safe condition.
Provide adequate facilities for the welfare of employees.
Provide information, instruction, training and supervision to
ensure employees are safe from injury.

Responsibilities of Employees.

Implement company policies and procedures.

Investigate accidents and incidents.

Ensure effective consultation.

Respond to occupational health, safety and welfare issues.

Maintain plant, equipment and housekeeping.

Ensure correct personal protective equipment is used and

maintained.

Factors involved in Risk

Assessment.

In Assessing the risk there are three factors that

are important:

1. Likelihood-What is the probability of it happening.

2. Degree of Exposure-How often would be exposed.

3. Consequence-If it happens, what will happen.

Assessing the risks

Gather as much information as possible about each identified

hazard.

Consider frequency and duration of exposure for all persons

affected.

Use the information to assess the likelihood and

consequences of each hazard.

Use a risk assessment tool to calculate a risk score and

priorities against other hazards.

Types of Risk Assessment.

Quantitative.
Assigns real numbers to costs of safeguards and damage
Based on probabilities of event occurring
Can be unreliable/inaccurate

Qualitative.

Generally used in Information Security

Hard to make meaningful valuations and meaningful
probabilities.
Relative ordering is faster and more important.

Many approaches to performing qualitative risk analysis.

Same basic steps as quantitative analysis.

Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA)

In summary, the methodology is:

1.Set the Context

Define the particular operational area.

2. Identify the risks.

3. Determine how serious the risks are.

Ask and write down what are the consequences if the
identified risks take place. For example, could a fault in our
operations lead to deaths ?

Cont

4. Determine how likely the risks are.

Use facts and previous experience. Has it ever happened in
this site ? In this industry ? How often ? What were the relevant
causal factors ? Do these factors apply in our situation ?

5. Classify the risks.

Risk = C x L x E
i.e. consequence x likelihood x exposure
A risk ranking index is useful.

Cont

6. Highlight the high priority risks.

The high priority risks are those with the highest CLE score
and any identified high consequence risk.

7. Analyze the high priority risks.

How can they occur ? What can we do to prevent the event
from happening, or if it happens how can we reduce the
consequences ?

8. Write the action plan.

Cont

9. Write the communication plan

-Who needs to know about the risk profile ?
-Who needs to know about our plans to reduce risk ?
-How will we keep them informed ?

10. Review the action plan

Are the risks being managed as planned ? status of
improvements ?

Event Tree Analysis

It starts with the event and considers different scenarios.
An event tree is a visual representation of all the events which
can occur in a system. As the number of events increases, the
picture fans out like the branches of a tree.

Event tree development

procedure
Step 1: Identification of the initiating event.
Step 2: Identification of safety function.
Step 3: Construction of the event tree.
Step 4: Classification of outcomes.
Step 5: Estimation of the conditional probability of each branch.
Step 6: Quantification of outcomes.
Step 7: Evaluation.

Example- Event Tree

Qualitative Risk Assessment

Qualitative risk analysis methods are used to set

priority for various purposes including further
analysis. They are useful when reliable data for
more quantitative approaches is not available.

Risk Rating
Letter

Risk Level

Risk Control Measures

Extreme Risk

High Risk

Immediate

Moderate Risk

Complete

Low Risk

Identify

Immediate action required.

Highest level corporate management needs to be involved.
action required.
Senior site management needs to be involved.
risk assessment.
Identify hazard and implement control to reduce risk.
Management responsibility must be defined.
hazard and implement control as required.
Manage by routine process.

Strengths of using this method

Provides a ranking of risk.

Encourages the team to understand the hazard in order

to rank the significance of the risk.

Responsibilities of Safety officer.

Never hurry while doing risk assessment.

Must be done several time.
Must give 1 to 2 solutions for each reason of Risk given.
Short, long, management solutions are three types of solution.
- short term 1. immediate action.
2. implement slowly.
3. Human behavior.
- Management-1. Enforcement of safety precaution.

Refrences

www.safework.sa.gov.au
www.hrdp-irdm.in
www.Ms1.mit.edu

Thank

you..