System safety in LPG fired furnace – a multi criteria decision making technique

Risk and safety are the important terms related with any industry and are linked conceptually and pragmatically. This paper illustrates the risk associated with an LPG fired furnace. The major risks involved in an LPG based gas furnaces are: leakages in the main LPG pipelines and improper working of equipment fitted with the LPG furnace. This paper proposes two methodologies for quantification of risk. The first one is based on the traditional risk and the second is based on Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). Analytical Hierarchy Process is a multi-criteria decision making technique, which breaks down a decision making problem in to a hierarchical structure, through which decision makers can bring about a comparison among different risk levels. The practical application of both traditional and AHP models are demonstrated with a case study concerning the safety of operations carried out in an LPG based gas furnace. The results obtained by analytical hierarchy process are compared with those obtained by traditional method of risk calculation. Comparing with the traditional method of risk calculation, the AHP technique of risk analysis have two advantages; by using AHP method, the risk assessment procedures become more comprehensive and also the risk calculated provides more precise values than that obtained by using traditional method and AHP is more conservative in the assessment of risks.