Risk Assessment of Gas Leakage from School Laboratories Based on the Bayesian Network

Abstract

In recent years, concerns about the safety of laboratories have been caused by several serious accidents in school laboratories. Gas leaks in the laboratory are often difficult to detect and cause serious consequences. In this study, a comprehensive model based on the Bayesian network is established for the assessment of the gas leaks evolution process and consequences in school laboratories. The model can quantitatively evaluate the factors affecting the probability and consequences of gas leakage. The results show that a model is an effective tool for assessing the risk of gas leakage. Among the various factors, the unsafe behavior of personnel has the greatest impact on the probability of gas leakage, and the concentration of toxic and harmful gases is the main factor affecting the consequences of accidents. Since the probability distribution of each node is obtained based on the experience of experts, there is a deviation in the quantitative calculation of the probability of gas leakage and consequences, but does not affect the risk analysis. This study could quantitatively assess the probability and consequences of gas leakage in the laboratory, and identify vulnerabilities, which helps improve the safety management level of gas in the school laboratory and reducing the possibility of gas leakage posing a threat to personal safety.

A Methodology for Dynamic Assessment of Laboratory Safety by SEM-SD

“…The sensitivity of each factor to laboratory safety level was also determined according to Equation (3). The CR results of each influencing factor regarding the laboratory safety level are provided in Figure 11.…”

“…However, some insights into lab accidents can be gained by using the partial statistical or regional data of lab accidents in open reports and the related literature, which is also enough to prove and demonstrate the severity of laboratory accident risk. According to statistics, there have been more than 260 accidents in chemical laboratories in the United States since 2001, most of which have caused casualties [ 3 ]. Recently, a few cases of lab accidents and the resulting injuries have aroused wide attention.…”

“…HAZOP (hazard and operability analysis) is the common and original method of lab safety management, which can help to allocate the measures according to the relative importance of risks [ 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 ]. Additionally, FMEA (failure mode effect and criticality analysis) [ 12 , 13 ], FTA (fault tree analysis) [ 14 , 15 ], ETA (event tree analysis) [ 16 , 17 ] and Bayesian networks (BNs) [ 3 , 13 ] have also been introduced into laboratory risk assessments. These various methods provide more options for risk identification from different perspectives [ 18 , 19 , 20 ].…”

A semi-quantitative methodology for risk assessment of university chemical laboratory

“…Pan and Wu (2019) established an early warning system for hazardous chemicals safety in university laboratories to identify weak links in the safety management of hazardous chemicals. Zhang et al (2020) used Bayesian network to analyze the dynamic evolution of gas release in university laboratories and to identified the factors affecting the probability of an accident. Pressure vessels are commonly used and highly dangerous equipment in university laboratories.…”

Modeling and Risk Analysis of Chemical Terrorist Attacks: A Bayesian Network Method

“…Users can enter the prior information of one or more variables in BN to update the probability of other nodes. BN, as a common decision-making method, is also widely used in many fields [32][33][34][35]. Bayesian network was used to develop a quantitative method for assessing the vulnerability of chemical facilities to external attacks [36].…”