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Targeting life-altering injuries and deaths
SCE’s partner DEKRA has been carrying out pioneering research on serious injuries and fatalities (SIFs) since the early 2000s. Electric utilities across the US increasingly view the reduction of serious, life-altering injuries and fatalities as the new playbook in health and safety. Despite long-standing reduction of minor health and safety incidents (often measured by the TRIR metric – total recordable incident rate), over the past few decades rates of SIFs have, in general, plateaued. “The fatality rate is pretty stable,” Marc Ulrich says, “although it has come down slightly over the last decade.”
The standard approach was to try and reduce the TRIR. “The feeling was that if you could get rid of TRIRs, then you will get rid of the life-altering and life-ending incidents. But what we have found with the TRIR falling is that the number of fatalities hasn’t gone down.
“And I’ll take 1,000 TRIRs over one fatality.”
Prior to teaming up with DEKRA’s operational safety and risk consulting practice in 2010, Duke Energy, a major American electric power and natural gas company with a large nuclear fleet, also had challenges in preventing fatalities across its operations. Most notably, in 2014, the company experienced three employee fatalities.
“There comes a moment when you think you’re turning the corner and making meaningful progress. Then a fatality occurs, and you’re reminded how quickly circumstances can change,” says Danny Landis, director of the corporate health and safety organisation at Duke. He adds that DEKRA helped Duke Energy internalise a key concept: that catastrophic events are typically not caused by a single mistake, but by a breakdown in the reliable execution of the basic practices that control hazards, a concept that DEKRA refers to as ‘behaviour reliability’.
“In the wake of a tragic event, you naturally ask, ‘Why did this happen, why did our controls fail?’ We try to focus the conversation on ourselves as a leadership team. That means a willingness to look inward before looking elsewhere, and a commitment to develop sustainable actions that will prevent reoccurrence.”
The fatal threshold: 1,500 joules
Both Duke Energy and SCE have established the baseline level of exposure to energy that has the potential to result in a SIF. An energy source (such as electricity measured in MW or MWh) is converted into joules. The more joules a body takes, the higher the likelihood of a severe injury. Ulrich says: “What we have found is that if a body takes 1,500 joules, the likely outcome is a fatality.”
At Duke there is a similar ‘high energy’ approach to SIFs. Following the employee fatalities in 2014, DEKRA was instrumental in assisting Duke in redeploying its Keys to Life (KTL) programme, which is still in place today. The programme was the company’s first engagement in energy-based safety. The individual keys are the high-energy activities Duke performs. The keys are aligned with an energy wheel and identify controls, both direct and alternative, that have been formally evaluated and prescribed for each KTL activity. “This is critical,” says Landis, “because every fatality we’ve experienced since the merger [with Progress Energy in 2012] has been in that high-energy space. We try to drive the high-energy risk out of the business, and where we have it, ensure we have robust controls to manage that risk.”
With a nuclear fleet, Duke Energy also applies the health and safety rigour associated with that sector to its operations.
“It’s no secret the nuclear industry is next level when it comes to health and safety,” says Landis. “Our nuclear generating fleet is one of the largest nuclear fleets in the country. The nuclear business unit rarely experiences a serious injury and typically experiences less than handful of recordable injuries a year, which is impressive.
“That experience in the nuclear industry has played a pivotal role in shaping our safety culture and fostering the company’s unwavering commitment to operational excellence.
“Years ago, some leaders viewed serious injuries as an unfortunate but inevitable part of working in the utility industry. Today, the organisation has a different mindset, and I attribute much of that to our nuclear heritage.”
Southern California Edison also uses a wheel to depict hazards. It codifies operations with potential for SIFs using a STKY (“stuff that kills you”) wheel:
The STKY wheel helps engineers identify hazards before they start work on a site. The aim is to help them introduce safety controls that alleviate or ideally eliminate risk. Controls that are incapable of being compromised by an employee are known as ‘direct controls’. For example, if a team is working on a road, then putting out traffic cones would be a control. Installing two-tonne concrete barriers is a direct control.
If an engineer is working at the top of a pole, a harness that works automatically is a direct control to prevent falls from height. The methodology is, “if you can eliminate the risk, eliminate the risk. If you can’t eliminate the risk, engineer a way to capture the high energy with direct controls, and if you can’t do that use alternate controls. Cones plus a flag are better than no controls,” explains Ulrich.
But controls, vital as they are, are only part of the story. “From DEKRA’s point of view, culture is what drives behavioural reliability in safety performance,” explains Dan McGonegle, vice president, DEKRA North America. “And what drives culture? Safety leadership.”
Human psychology is an important influence too. DEKRA has identified what it calls ‘brain-centred hazards’ to which we are all susceptible, which include conducting tasks unconsciously (ever driven somewhere with no recollection of how you got there, for example?), working with divided attention, and even the desire to fit in socially. This latter factor can make it difficult to speak up if a person feels work is not being conducted safely.
James Grant, of DEKRA North America, says that for most of us, a negative social reaction is akin to “getting punched in the face”. “People want to avoid that so they assimilate for survival. But that is also what we call a ‘human error trap’, where we won’t bring up things that we should.” Knowing about these error traps means understanding that “our brains are wired for failure”, adds Grant. “It also helps leaders understand that people will always fail, and if you rely on a human being to be perfect, your system is broken. The possibility of error has to be built in.”
DEKRAs Angelica Grindle, who has a PhD in applied behavioural science for improving health and safety, says that utilities don’t lack the systems to keep people safe but need to account for the vagaries of people, too. “While it is tempting to assume everyone will do what management wants them to do, this doesn’t take into consideration how incredibly important the culture is, and the human side of safety.”
McGonegle emphasises this point. “You can be doing everything right as an organisation from a safety standpoint, but people’s brains are wired for error. They are not meant to work in these high-hazard environments, so examples of error traps are things like fatigue, lack of communication, or discomfort.
“Am I going to be comfortable shutting down a supply chain by stopping work? If you think about that, there is a staggering amount of pressure to keep that supply chain going. And with fast brain thinking, for people who have done something for 30 years, there’s a level of comfort that increases risk.
“New hires might actually be safer. But both mindsets carry different risks.”
“While it is tempting to assume everyone will do what management wants them to do, this doesn’t take into consideration how incredibly important the culture is, and the human side of safety.”
Angelica Grindle, DEKRA
