Assessment the implementation of OSHA Process Safety Management in chemicals industry in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

In 1992, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) promulgated the Process Safety Management (PSM) standard, which incorporated fourteen elements. The main goal of the PSM standard is to decrease the occurrence of the major accidents in the oil, gas and chemical industries, which can significantly result in loss of lives, financial losses and negative environmental impacts. This study assesses the level of the implementation of the PSM in chemical industries in Saudi Arabia considering three levels of organisations, i.e., Large, Medium and Small. The philosophy of this study is that the implementation of the PSM is established at the organisational level and then carried out by the individual levels of any organisation. Hence, this study considers two variables: 1) the implementation of PSM at the organisational level, and 2) the understanding of the importance of this implementation at the individual levels reflected by their safety culture. The objective of this study, therefore, is to identify the elements that could fail in PSM from the organisational level, the individual levels and the overall level of implementation. This study conducted mixed methods of research, namely, quantitative method using questionnaire-based survey and qualitative method using open-ended comments that were embedded in the questionnaire. The sample population of this study were 148 respondents. The results of this study show that all three levels of organisations have significant chances of failure in contractors’ management element at both the organisational and the individual levels while only at the individual levels in the mechanical integrity element. Additionally, the lack of understanding on the importance of using the PSI documentations could lead to failure in the medium and small companies at the individual levels. Nevertheless, effective implementation of PSM has been shown to be applied in the studied three levels of organisations. The statistical analysis of the data shows that there is positive correlation between the PSM implementation and safety culture. It also indicates that the effective implementation of the PSM positively and significantly influence safety culture (Beta = 0.506 p<0.001). The findings of this study not only contribute to the regulators in Saudi Arabia, but also to the chemical companies' managers and researchers.