The use of a safety case approach to support decision making in design

In many of the high hazard industries the safety case and safety report approach is required under major hazards legislation. The benefit of the approach is the demonstration that the risks of an operation or a facility are reduced to as low as reasonably practicable and that continued operation is justified on health and safety grounds. The principles behind the development of a safety case are the development of an argument, the presentation of information to support the argument and a permanent record of that information for future use. These features are in themselves useful to organisations to assist risk management and possibly to meet wider requirements of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. The Safety Case approach has been adopted during in major infrastructure projects specifically to assist decision-making. The approach has been used to assess levels of safety management and residual risks with certain design options. In areas where there has been concern over health and safety aspects of the options, the safety case has been used as the forum for analysing and presenting the arguments for or against the options. A process of consultation with the stakeholders using the safety case has been carried out to gain agreement on which option to select.