Functional Safety & SIL

What is the difference between Verification and Validation in Functional Safety?

In this short guide, we will learn about two important concepts in the Functional Safety world, Verification and Validation and the difference between the two. What is Verification and Validation? Although colloquially these two words may sound similar, yet in the Functional Safety World, they are distinct concepts and different from each other, as different as chalk and cheese. To have a quick overview of this, you can watch …

ISA-TR84.00.09-2023 Cybersecurity related to the Functional Safety Lifecycle-Draft published

The ISA-TR84.00.09-2023 Part 1 (Draft) technical report is ready for review and comments. You can download the draft isa-tr84.00.09 pdf and if you have any comments, you can submit them to the ISA committee, if the committee approves, it will be incorporated into the next draft or published as the final report after all approved changes, comments have been incorporated. What is ISA TR 84? ISA is the International …

Functional Safety Industrial Cybersecurity

How Bad Industrial Cybersecurity degrades Functional Safety to being ineffective

Functional Safety and Industrial Cybersecurity- what’s the connection? In this short explanatory white paper, we will discuss how a bad Industrial cybersecurity posture can degrade Functional Safety to be almost ineffective, in protecting assets, people and the environment. Thus having proper Industrial Cybersecurity is a pre-requisite to having proper Functional Safety. What is Functional Safety all about? Functional Safety is a specialized domain within the Safety world, which deals …

Proof Testing Safety Instrumented Systems

In this short guide we will learn something about proof testing Safety Instrumented Systems. What is a Proof Test of a Safety Instrumented System? Proof testing is the process by which the end user actually tests whether the Safety Instrumented System is actually working as intended. A Proof test has to be carried out for every Safety Instrumented Function (SIF for short). For example, if a SIF is supposed …

What is the ANSI ISA S84 Standard? Is it a legal requirement?

In this short guide, we will take a look at the ANSI ISA S84 standard. What is ISA S84.01? This is the Functional Safety standard published by ISA (International Systems and Automation Society)’s S 84 committee. This is applicable to functional safety in the process industries. The standard was initially published as ANSI/ISA S84.01:1996 and was recognized by OSHA as a “generally accepted good engineering practice” via their letter …

Safety Instrumented System Requirements

In this small guide we will understand Safety Instrumented System requirements. But first we answer some basic questions such as, What is a Safety Instrumented System? The simplest explanation of a Safety Instrumented System (SIS for short) is ” a system comprised of active elements such as sensors, logic solvers and actuators, working together as a system, which acts to reduce the risk of an unwanted event in a …

What is the difference between IEC 61511 and IEC 61508?

In the next few minutes of reading this you will understand the difference between IEC 61511 and IEC 61508. What is IEC 61511? IEC 61511 is the process industry standard for Functional Safety and Safety Instrumented Systems. This standard has been developed by the International Electrotechnical Commission and is used globally. Process industries are those industries that handle bulk materials (rather than discrete parts) and include the Oil & …

Safety Instrumented Systems IEC 61511

Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS for short) that are used in the process industry sector, such as Oil and Gas platforms, Petroleum refineries, chemical manufacturing plants, pulp and paper, fossil fuel power generation plants and so on generally comply with the international standard IEC 61511. This standard, published by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) is the most widely used standard all over the world for building and maintaining SIS in …

Functional Safety Training in India at Baker Hughes

Functional Safety Training in India After a gap of two years, Abhisam has restarted Functional Safety Training in India. Recently, Abhisam conducted the Abhisam Functional Safety, SIL & SIS Cybersecurity (Level 1) workshop for engineers of Baker Hughes at their Mumbai office. About Baker Hughes Baker Hughes is a leading Energy Technology company in the world. For more than a century Baker Hughes inventions have revolutionized the world of …

What is an SRS (Safety Requirement Specification)? Why is it important?

What is a Safety Requirement Specification? (SRS for short)? A Safety Requirement Specification is one of the most important documents in any Safety Instrumented Systems project. This document forms the design basis of the Safety Instrumented System and has the detailed specifications of every Safety Instrumented Function (SIF) which comprises the SIS. When is the document made? If you refer to the Safety Lifecycle according to IEC 61511 (ISA …

What is SIL? Should we select SIL 4 for our Safety Instrumented Function?

Jenny is a young engineer assigned to a project to install a new Safety Instrumented System for a plant. Eddie is her supervisor, who is in charge of the project. Jenny wonders why have different SILs for different SIFs. Eddie explains the reasons. Watch the video below to know more. What is SIL? Safety Integrity Level (SIL) is a measure used to describe the integrity of a Safety Instrumented …

Safety Instrumented Systems- Design

Many process plants handle large amounts of hazardous materials (including flammable, explosive or toxic chemicals) at high temperatures and pressures (or in vacuum conditions)via complex processes. Hence there is a risk that there could be a disaster if something goes wrong and we could have fires, explosions and toxic chemical releases that can harm people and the environment. These incidents also damage assets and cause large scale destruction. In …

Safety Instrumented Systems- a Life-cycle approach works best

What are Safety Instrumented Systems? Safety Instrumented Systems are automation systems that kick into action when some deviation from the normal operating parameters has the potential to trigger an unwanted incident. These include both (relatively) simple systems like OPS (overfill prevention systems), that prevent overfilling a storage tank by sensing the high level and automatically stopping the inlet flow on high level, as well as more complex systems such …

IEC TR 61511-4:2020- Competency Management Requirements

What is IEC TR 61511-4: 2020? This is the latest publication in the IEC 61511 (Functional Safety – safety instrumented systems for the process industry sector) series. It is a Technical Report which gives explanations for updates to the various clauses in the latest edition of IEC 61511. According to the IEC website this technical report: • specifies the rationale behind all clauses and the relationship between them, • …

Free Functional Safety Book pdf | Abhisam

Abhisam is pleased to launch its Quick Guide to Basic Functional Safety & SIL, which is being offered free for a limited time. This free functional safety book pdf guide/Safety Instrumented System pdf explains everything that you need to know about the basics of functional safety and SIL (safety integrity level). This can be used by any engineer or technical professional who wants to understand Functional Safety as used …

What is the Safety Life Cycle? | Functional Safety IEC 61511

The Safety Life Cycle The Safety Life cycle is an important concept in the domain of Functional Safety. It recognizes the fact that “Safety” is not a one shot affair, or something like a standard product or service that can be obtained by a one time payment or effort. Rather Safety (including Functional Safety, Process Safety, Occupational Safety and all other branches of Industrial Safety) are a process and …

What is a Safety Instrumented System?

A Safety Instrumented System (SIS for short) is used in many process plants to ensure continued safe operation of the process. In case of any disturbance that is likely to result in an unwanted incident the SIS automatically brings the process to a safe state and prevents loss of life, asset damage and environmental damage. For process plants that handle hazardous, toxic, explosive or other similar materials, Safety Instrumented …

What is a Safety Instrumented Function?

What is a Safety Instrumented Function? One of the most fundamental questions related to Functional Safety and Safety Instrumented Systems is this-what is a safety instrumented function? Once you understand what a Safety Instrumented Function (SIF) means, you will immediately grasp the connection between safety instrumented functions and a Safety Instrumented System (SIS). But more on that later. Any plant or piece of equipment that has the potential to …

Become a Certified Functional Safety Professional (Level 1)

Functional Safety Certification Functional Safety Certification is essential for all engineering professionals, who wish to work with Safety Instrumented Systems in industry. Most employers and clients demand that people that they employ have a good understanding of Functional Safety concepts, Standards that are in use and engineering practices. This competency requirement is now mandatory. Take this Functional Safety Certification course (Level 1) from Abhisam from the comfort of your …

Certified Functional Safety Professional-Training Workshop in Mumbai-Nov 2017

Update: July 2020:Functional Safety Training We have suspended all in person workshops, due to the pandemic. But all of these have now been replaced by easy, self paced e-learning Functional Safety courses, that you can take online. They are NOT videos of a professor speaking or a simple power point presentation. They are full fledged e-learning courses with text, animations, simulations, real life examples and calculations, exercises, videos and …