associated with it. However, the assumption that safety slows down production and reduces productivity by diverting people from non-value added activities is patently false.

“There’s this assumption that safety costs them money, but it’s not true,” says Gruhn, who insists that meeting safety standards has significant benefits that actually improve production efficiency.

“Such statements are a myth that should not be allowed to continue,” he adds. “End-users made the same complaint when OSHA introduced the PSM Process Safety Management (PSM) of Highly Hazardous Chemicals (HHCs) standard, 29 CFR 1910.119 regulation over a dozen years ago. OSHA has reported that not only have the number of accidents gone down over 20 percent, but companies are reporting that their productivity is higher [as a result of doing PSM].”

Gruhn also points to the experience of Houston-based ConocoPhillips. In 1997, Conoco put out an RFP for the construction of a refinery in Venezuela, including the required safety features. Managers at the winning contractor did not plan on implementing them, but once forced to comply, found that they’d had to do such a thorough job planning and organizing things that their productivity increased dramatically. In fact, they were able to complete the job at a lower cost than anticipated.
 
“As long as management believes that safety will cost them money, they won’t want to do the required tasks. However, once they realize that safety will save them money and improve their productivity, their attitudes and actions will change,” Gruhn contends.

“The safety standards make you more diligent in analyzing your process and your hazards,” adds Hampshire. “When you do that, you always find something you can change or re-engineer to improve safety or productivity. I see that a lot. You pick up things you might not have seen in the past.”

“Safety is always an issue for a company when there is an accident,” says Bukowski. “But if you do it right from the beginning, then you can avoid accidents and all the expenses that go with them.”

Related Sidebar - Additional Organizations and Links
To read the article accompanying this story, go to www.automationworld.com/feature-5489.

Related Sidebar - Some Safety Standards You Should be Familiar With
To read the article accompanying this story, go to www.automationworld.com/feature-5490.

Subscribe to Automation World's RSS Feeds for Feature Articles