Process safety leadership matters at Hazards 26

6th January 2016

Registrations are now open for Europe’s leading process safety conference, Hazards 26, which comes to Scotland in May.

First staged in 1960, Hazards is widely regarded as Europe’s leading process safety conference. The event will take place in Edinburgh over three days from 24-26 May 2016.

Organised by the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) in association with the Mary Kay O’Connor Process Safety Centre, Hazards 26 will focus on the crucial topic of leadership and competence in process safety. Over 350 delegates are expected to participate, in a programme that will feature leading speakers from industry, academia and regulatory bodies.

This year’s conference will welcome former chief executive of Shell UK and chair of the COMAH Strategic Forum, Ken Rivers. Rivers recently led the Buncefield report, detailing progress since the disaster in 2005. Vice president of process safety at BP, Cheryl A Grounds will also be a keynote, reflecting on her 30 year career in process safety, and Alan Chesterman, Apache North Sea senior manager, will discuss the prevention of offshore major accident hazards in the UK continental shelf.

This year’s event received a record-breaking number of abstracts, up 25% on last year’s conference. The number indicates that even in tough economic times, process safety remains high on the industry agenda.

Newly honoured Dame Judith Hackitt, IChemE past president and Chair of the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) said: “Process safety conferences such as Hazards 26 provide an important reminder that safety is of the utmost importance in our industry. We are all responsible for our own safety and for the safety of those around us – regardless of role, seniority or job title.”

IChemE’s Safety Centre will host a free-of-charge workshop at the event. The session will be led by centre director Trish Kerin, and Dr Sam Mannan, from the Mary Kay O’Connor Process Safety Center, in Texas, USA. It will focus on the current status of process safety worldwide - with the aim to building a future roadmap for the discipline.

Registration is now open at: http://www.icheme.org/hazards26, with an early-bird £100 discount available for registrations received before 1 March 2016.

The full programme will be available in February.