*2.1.1.3 The information systems of industrial accidents in the EU*

The information systems of the industrial accidents are a useful tool for supporting the decision-making process of prevention and also the solution of the major industrial accident prevention. Currently these information systems contain databases that concentrate data about the emergencies and participate in preventing


#### **Table 2.**

*Causes and consequences of selected industrial accidents [15, 16].*

*Risk Management in the Area of Major Industrial Accident Prevention in the EU… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.98406*

similar crisis phenomena. The Major Accident Hazards Bureau (MAHB) ensures the summarisation of the data form analysing the major industrial accidents in the EU. The MAHB provides the basic research and scientific support to the EU in the area of formulating, realising and monitoring the EU policies with the goal to check the risks of developing major industrial accidents.

The industrial accidents are gathered in the national and multinational databases. The most useful databases concentrating the data about the accidents are:


The MARS database collects data about the major industrial accidents and near misses in the SEVESO III companies in the EU. The purpose of the database is to provide data for the statistic assessment with the goal to avoid development of such events and it also serves as a source of lessons from the accidents. Based on the in advance defined rules of the responsible institutions in the EU the EU member states provide information about the major industrial accidents and near-misses to the Joint Research Centre of EC in Ispra through the electronic database MARS. The report of the event to the MARS database is obligatory for the EU member states in the case of an event that fulfils the criteria of a major industrial accident presented in the Appendix IV of the SEVESO III Directive.

The MARS database can be utilised by the bodies of the state administration of the EU member states, the industrial and trade associations, Trade Unions, etc. Currently there is at disposal also the interactive version of the database, the so-called eMARS version that is available at the internet.


#### **Table 3.**

*Contingency table of accidents according to type and year [15].*

The **Table 3** brings the classification according to the types of the accident and the year when the given type of accident developed during 2010–2019. As we can see the largest amount of the most serious accidents developed in 2010–2030 accidents. The lowest number of the major accidents was registered in 2019 – only one accident. However, during the last three years, not all accidents have been recorded and therefore the amount of the accidents can increase. The near-miss is another type of the accident. The highest number of the near misses was in 2012–9 accidents. The lowest amount of the near misses is registered in 2011 and 2019–0. However, the number can be changed in 2019 – similarly as in the case of the major accident. The last accident type is the so called another event. The highest number is recorded in the years 2012 and 2013–5, on the other hand there was none in 2014. In 2012 we registered the highest amount of all the aforementioned types – 42 accidents, on the contrary the lowest amount was in 2019 – only two of them. Also in the case of the year 2019, the number of the accidents can be changed due to registering other accidents.

Another directive directly connected with the SEVESO III Directive is the SPIRS database (SEVESO Plants Information Retrieval System). This database gathers especially the data identifying the SEVESO establishments (their name, address, location in the framework of the country's territory, hazardous substances in the company and their volume, number of employees, number of citizens in the circle of 5 and 10 kilometres, the distance from the nearest water course, the company activity, etc.).

There are several other databases worldwide gathering the data about the industrial accidents. One of them is also the ARIA database formed by the Bureau for Analysis of Industrial Risks and Pollutions (BARPI) in 1992 by the French Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy [16].

The database FACTS is a functional one in the Netherlands and includes data about more than 23,000 industrial accidents with hazardous substances globally during the recent 90 years. It contains not only the accidents that happened but also the near-misses from the point of view of their seriousness and consequences. The most serious ones are processed in the form of reports that are available and provide a data flow for assessing the risk and preventing the failures [18].

Germany has a database for the industrial accidents called ZEMA. It comprises data about small accidents but also about serious ones affecting seriously the population, environment and property [20].

#### *2.1.1.4 Major industrial accident prevention in the Slovak Republic*

The Slovak Republic is a small country; however, the industrial accidents occurred also in its territory. The legal framework for the major industrial accidents in the SEVESO III context began to be solved after the Slovak Republic had entered the EU in 2004. In Slovakia, there are about 80 SEVESO establishment and they are divided to the categories A and B [21]. Their number can be changed due to recategorising of the companies.

The legal regulations controlling the area of protection against the consequences of industrial accidents have an important place in the Slovak legal system. Their goal is to protect people, the environment and material values against the negative impacts of the industrial accidents but also other crisis phenomena connected with leaking hazardous substances to the air, soil or water.

The Ministry of Environment of the Slovak Republic is responsible for the preparation of the legal regulations in the area of preventing and removing the consequences of the industrial accidents, however, partial tasks in this area are also fulfilled by the Ministry of Interior of the Slovak Republic or the Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic. Besides the legal regulations that are generally obligatory, there are also technical standards that are only recommended.

*Risk Management in the Area of Major Industrial Accident Prevention in the EU… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.98406*

The following legal regulations solve the area of the major industrial accident prevention:


There are several subjects in the area of the MIA prevention that are mutually interactive:


In the further text, we will characterise the individual competencies of all represented subjects that participate in the major industrial prevention in practice.

The most intensive collaboration takes place between the Ministry of Environment of the Slovak Republic, Slovak Agency of Environment and district offices in the seat of the regions.

According to the law about MIA prevention the companies are divided into two categories – the A category (the upper tier) And B category (the lower tier). The number is equal, it can change regarding to the re-categorisation of the companies from the A to the B group or including a new enterprise under the law about MIA prevention. The companies differ from each other especially in the area of the defined obligations that have to be fulfilled and the categorisation itself is realised according to the total number of the hazardous substances in the enterprise (according to the Appendix 1 in the law of MIA prevention) [21].

The threshold quantities defined in the tables in the first and second part of the law about MIA prevention relate to each enterprise. The quantities that are to be taken into account are the maximal amounts that are present or can probably be present at any moment. The hazardous substances present in the company amounting 2% or less than 2% of the corresponding threshold quantity are not taken into consideration for calculating the total present volume if their location in the company cannot cause any major industrial accident in another part of the enterprise [21].

If the company has no hazardous substance in an amount that is greater or equals the corresponding threshold quantity the following rule for defining the fact whether the company is under the law about MIA prevention is used.

The law relates to the companies of the B category, if the sum:

$$N = \frac{q\_1}{Q\_{\mathcal{B}1}} + \frac{q\_2}{Q\_{\mathcal{B}2}} + \frac{q\_3}{Q\_{\mathcal{B}3}} + \frac{q\_4}{Q\_{\mathcal{B}3}} + \frac{q\_5}{Q\_{\mathcal{B}5}} + \dots + \frac{q\_{\times}}{Q\_{\mathcal{A}\infty}} \ge \mathbf{1} \tag{1}$$

N = is the sum of the relative quantities of two or several hazardous substances present in the company,

qx = is the amount of the hazardous substance x (or the present hazardous substances of the same class/category) according to the part 1 or 2,

QBX = is the corresponding threshold quantity for the hazardous substances or the class/category "x" from the column 3 – part 1 or from the column 3 – part 2.

The law relates to the companies of the B category, if the sum:

$$N = \frac{q\_1}{Q\_{A1}} + \frac{q\_2}{Q\_{A2}} + \frac{q\_3}{Q\_{A3}} + \frac{q\_4}{Q\_{A4}} + \frac{q\_5}{Q\_{A5}} + ... + \frac{q\_x}{Q\_{AX}} \ge 1\tag{2}$$

N = is the sum of the relative quantities of two or several hazardous substances present in the company,

qx = is the amount of the hazardous substance x (or the present hazardous substances of the same class/category) according to the part 1 or 2,

QAX = is the corresponding threshold quantity for the hazardous substance or the class/category "x" from the column 2 – part 1 or from the column 2 – part 2 [21].

#### *2.1.1.5 Information systems of the industrial accidents in Slovakia*

Currently there are two information systems serving for registering the industrial accidents in Slovakia – the Information System of MIA Prevention and the Information System of the Industrial Accidents. Both information systems serve for gathering, recording, listing, searching, utilising, saving and transferring information about the industrial accidents in Slovakia [14].

#### **3. Risk management of the industrial processes**

The risk assessment and risk management are problematic areas in the area of the MIA prevention. The existence of a whole range of the systematic procedures, methods, techniques and software means increases the uncertainty rate for comparing the results of various companies in the framework of processing the safety documentation. Therefore the scientific and research activities in this area should bring new knowledge and approaches that will bring optimal solutions.

#### **3.1 Position and importance of the risk management in the area of MIA prevention**

The risk assessment and management is an interdisciplinary filed that is used in a lot of areas of the social life. Every company has to fulfil both the strategic and operational objectives in the individual sectors of its activity. The manufacturing process management, HR, management of the financial processes, quality and safety and a whole range of others belong here. The safety management as one of the non-profit company activities seems to be superfluous if there are no crisis phenomena until anything happens. The safety management is realised with an emphasis on the area of Safety and Protection of Health at Work, on the environment but also the accident prevention if we work with the hazardous substances in our processes. The risk assessment and management is the basis for implementing the preventive measures and reducing the risk of developing the crisis phenomena.

The risk assessment and management is of the key importance from the point of view of minimising the damages and losses of our interests. The protection of life, property and environment cannot be ensured without identifying the risk sources,

*Risk Management in the Area of Major Industrial Accident Prevention in the EU… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.98406*

their analysis and assessment from the point of view of undesirable effects of the hazardous substance.

### **3.2 Approaches and systematic procedures of the risk assessment utilised in the companies**

In general we can say that the risk management process consisting of assessing and managing the risks can be implemented in every area of the social life. The unbinding standards in the form of the ISO standards are transposed to the legal standards of several countries worldwide. ISO 31 000 Risk Management was issued in 2019 and was implemented to the individual EU member states. This process can be implemented for the whole organisation and all processes that are realised in its framework. Sometimes the organisations evaluate and manage the risks only up to a certain level. This standard defines several principles that are to be fulfilled for the process to be effective. Its main aim is the development, implementation and continual improvement of the framework whose purpose is to integrate the risk management process to the company management, to its strategy and planning processes, management and also to the process of reporting, policies and other activities.

According to STN ISO 31 000, the risk management process represents a systematic implementation of the policies, procedures and implementation of practice for these specific activities (see the **Figure 1**) [23].

The **Figure 1** depicts the overall risk management process. In practice the organisations manage the risks through identifying, analysing and assessing them and subsequently they evaluate which means to use to reduce the unacceptable risks to an acceptable level. During the whole process they communicate and consult with the interested parties and monitor the risks and then the measures that were implemented. The standard used the term risk treatment; however, the MIA prevention area uses the term risk management.

The risk management of the industrial processes is realised especially in connection with fulfilling the legal requirements. The most frequent reason for its realisation is the employees' protection in the framework of the safety and protection of health at work. It is more complicated to assess and manage the risks in the case of

**Figure 1.** *Risk management process [23].*

#### *Risk Management*

the accident development prevention, especially in those conditions that have to fulfil the requirements of the law about MIA prevention.

The risk assessment process in the industrial enterprises (according to the law about MIA prevention) consists of:


The risk assessment as an independent phase is part of the operator's documentation in compliance with the law and therefore it is important for the company representatives to understand this process and to be able to realise it appropriately. The risk assessment and management can be realised by a whole range of approaches, however, the idea algorithm has certain parallels. The logic of the overall procedure is the same almost in any environment; it is different only in the points that are specific for the given area. If the person (expert) that carries it out will understand its essence and usability, he/she is able to implement this process and to choose the optimal methods and techniques of the individual steps of this approach.

The following items can be utilised for the risk assessment:


#### *3.2.1 Systematic procedures for the risk assessment*

The systematic procedures are complex algorithms that utilise the methods, techniques and mathematical formulae in the individual steps. The most frequently used are:

