Situation

With around 460 employees, Nyrstar produces approximately 290,000 tonnes of very high-quality zinc per year in Budel-Dorplein in the province of North-Brabant. The company strives for maximum returns on the use of the mineral resources and by-products that it manufactures. The company attaches great importance to safety. In order to continuously improve, Nyrstar asked KH Engineering to improve safety at the location in a structured way and to demonstrate the higher level of safety to the government.

Solution

For this assignment, Nyrstar called on KH Engineering’s (HSE) Safety Engineering department. In order to meet the client’s needs, we carried out HAZOP studies with Nyrstar. This is a recognised method of identifying process risks for each plant component. Nyrstar employees were trained in the HAZOP methodology and the implementation of a better software package for the registration of the HAZOP sessions and the follow-up of the various actions were ensured.

In addition to process safety, KH Engineering also classified instrumental safety using the SIL (Safety Integrity Level) methodology. KH Engineering thus demonstrates the reliability of the safety instruments. And Nyrstar can take proportional measures to continuously improve safety, in accordance with the Layer Of Protection Analysis (LOPA) method. A team of discipline specialists from Nyrstar carried out these studies, under the chairmanship of an independent specialist from KH Engineering.

We updated the required documentation, which provides insight into the explosion hazard within the ATEX framework. In addition, KH Engineering advised the client on minimising the risk of potential ignition sources.