The branch’s April Technology Evening was held on 1 April, but fortunately the time for April fools jokes was over when Divan Pretorius, senior engineer at Proconics, got down to the serious business of tackling Hazardous Area Classification and the legal requirements for safety and control of industrial combustion and fuel-handling systems in South Africa.
Divan (left) being thanked by branch chairman Howard Lister.
Divan pointed out that current legislation in South Africa requires compliance with a number of SANS Standards and one of particular interest and relevance to instrumentation and control practitioners is SANS 329. It specifies requirements for fuel-handling and combustion equipment in terms of design, ordering, construction and operation, and is applicable to gaseous, liquid and solid fuels. The standard mostly focuses on control and safeguarding systems, but does also stipulate a number of electrical and mechanical requirements. The presentation showed examples of typical requirements, and typical findings from audits conducted in the refining environment as well as issues regarding hazardous area classification of fired heaters and similar equipment.
His presentation prompted quite a long question and answer session with the attentive audience, after which discussion of the technical issues continued over an excellent supper supplied by the Durban Country Club.
As a certified functional safety professional and an authorised gas practitioner with SAGA (South African Gas Association), Divan was well qualified to present on this topic and the evening was kindly sponsored by Proconics.
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