The Challenge

Our client operates a Nuclear Laboratory to handle and analyse heavy isotopes radioactive samples (such as Plutonium isotopes) for research purposes, i.e. nuclear monitoring and dating applications. Nuclear safety engineering services were required to assess the risks associated to the replacement of the gloves in more than 10 gloveboxes inside the Nuclear Laboratory.

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What We Did

Plan Safe and our partner ALARP Solutions have undertaken a detailed Hazard Analysis, tailored to the client’s need (i.e. assessing two different concept of operations) composed of the following steps:

• Walking-through the laboratory to collect contextual information and understand the risks inherent in the Glovebox’s glove replacement operation.
• Identifying the credible hazardous scenarios, via appropriate hazard identification techniques, e.g. Hazard Identification (HAZID), together with their Initiating Events.
• Engaging with the relevant stakeholders through a risk assessment workshop to assess the radiological consequences, likelihood and determine the inherent risk for each hazardous scenario.
• Finally, identifying the mitigation measures and quantifying the residual risk to determine whether the risks have been reduced to As Low As Reasonably Practicable (ALARP) / tolerable levels.

The Outcome

The hazard analysis report produced enabled the client to have an overall understanding of the risk profile associated to this hazardous operation, determine the most suitable method to conduct this operation, with a set of mitigation measures and recommendations needed to reduce the risks to tolerable levels and ensure the safety of its operators.