Listen, learn and lead - remote functional safety trining
June 4, 2023
Jon Keswick, CFSE

In today's evolving business landscape, remote work has become a necessity rather than a luxury. Training teams in functional safety principles, particularly those working remotely, poses unique challenges. However, self-paced online training offers a viable solution, allowing for flexible, consistent, and effective learning experiences. There is now quite an large Read More

Hazard barrier - HAZOP, PHA
April 10, 2023
Jon Keswick, CFSE

To answer the question "what is HAZOP?" you first need to know that it is an abbreviation of HAZard and OPerability; a brainstorming study technique looking at how industrial process plant can go wrong.  A HAZOP study is a team analysis exercise, often used in the design stage of new Read More

World needs renewable energy
March 17, 2022
Jon Keswick, CFSE

Functional safety and fuel cells may seem to have little cross-over on first glance. However,  stationary fuel cell safety standard IEC 62282-3-100 requires a written hazard and risk assessment, and fuel cell functional safety design principles.Such assessments may not seem challenging at first, but certain early decisions are critical to Read More

Checking for the correct SIL assignment and SIL PFD/PFH calculation
October 8, 2021
Jon Keswick, CFSE

Safety Integrity Level, SIL Calculation is necessary when a Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS) is one of the critical independent protection layers for process safety. Applications of SIS include automated isolation, trips or interlocks found commonly in oil & gas upstream, refining, chemical and pharmaceutical production.Get the correct inputs firstBefore a Read More

May 6, 2021
Stephen Burke, CFSE

Do you need a SIL verification calculation for a Safety Instrumented Function (SIF) with Safety Integrity Level (SIL) performance requirement? You will find examples in both the IEC 61508 and IEC 61511 standards, and this article may help with outlining the basic requirements.There are also several software tools available that Read More

Safety PLC logic solver
March 5, 2021
Jon Keswick, CFSE

When it comes to implementing safety instrumented systems (SIS) to comply with functional safety standard IEC 61511, the safety PLC is a pivotal system to specify. So, what are the key questions that you need to ask if choosing a new system supplier? Read more here.Safety PLC or Regular PLC?A standard PLC Read More

eFunctionalSafety teaches courses about safety instrumented systems
October 7, 2020
Jon Keswick, CFSE

Suppose your staff and contractors need to get up to speed with improving IEC 61511 functional safety competence for safety instrumented systems. If that's the case, this is the right blog for you.Developed over the past seven years, we've delivered many years of experience to hundreds of professionals with our Read More

What is hardware fault tolerance - HFT
September 3, 2020
Jon Keswick, CFSE

You may not know or care much about Hardware Fault Tolerance (HFT) unless you're working in a hazardous industry with Safety Integrity Level *SIL requirements. However, just like the multiple safety systems in your motor vehicle, systems used for protecting hazardous process plants are often built with intentional redundancy, both for Read More

Safety Instrumented Function - SIF Design
July 28, 2020
Jon Keswick, CFSE

Like any many other safety engineering activities, safety instrumented function design usually involves several repeated rounds of activity. Nevertheless, there are broadly five key steps involved.A SIF gets specified as an automated independent protection layer (IPL), often as the result of a safety integrity level (SIL) target-setting exercise, also known Read More