In March 2021, independent inspection services company TÜV Rheinland certified ABB’s Safety Execution Center (SEC) in Houston, Texas. This solidifies ABB’s long-term commitment to operational safety for its products, engineering and project teams, and installation methods across industries, such as oil and gas, chemicals, pulp and paper, mining, pharmaceuticals, and power generation.
The international certification acknowledges that ABB’s functional safety management system at the Houston center is in compliance with all relevant sections of the international standards IEC 61508 and IEC 61511 for integration and implementation of safety instrumented systems (SIS), including system configuration, application programming and testing for specific industrial safety applications.
“Safety is one of the top priorities at ABB, and the certification of the Houston SEC better positions us with our customers in the United States in terms of functional safety management. We have world-class capabilities to support customers’ risk management strategies, facilitating safe, smart and sustainable operations,” said Shouresh Amir-Tahmasseb, Energy Industries Division Engineering Manager, ABB US.
Safety lifecycle management
ABB has been developing in-country SECs to provide its Process Automation customers access to dedicated and competent functional safety resources for SIS project execution, design, engineering, modification and maintenance as well as local safety standard experts and technology experts.
Currently, ABB has more than 600 TÜV, CFSE-certified and ABB technology-certified safety engineers worldwide, who are managed along with the safety execution centers by UK-based ABB Global FSM Technical Authority.
“Our customers require technology partners to demonstrate compliance to IEC safety standards, which showcases our safety lifecycle management capabilities. The TÜV certification reinforces our technical project and service healthcare bid and proposals process, helping us to qualify for more safety project and service RFQs (request for quotations),” said John Walkington, Energy Industries Head of Department for Global Functional Safety Technical Authority Services, ABB GB.
Boosting efficiency and productivity
ABB’s Energy Industries Division in the United States has implemented numerous safety systems, covering a wide variety of protective and mitigation safety instrumented systems, such as emergency shutdown (ESD), process shutdown (PSD), fire and gas (F&G), and burner managements systems (BMS). These safety systems optimize operations for our customers, helping to maximize availability of equipment and assets, increase reliability and improve overall performance.
ABB has been at the forefront of safety system development and delivery, and continues to be at the leading edge of providing functional safety project management, cyber security assurance, digital solutions for next step improvements, SIL-capable products and systems, process and functional safety consultancy, and safety lifecycle service support for SIS.
