A journey toward electrical workplace safety and production reliability

This paper outlines the experience of one global cement producer that embarked on site surveys and studies to achieve arc flash safety compliance at 13 cement plants in the U.S. and Canada. The enterprise wide electrical workplace safety initiative resulted in compliance by all plant sites to the latest standards, with new labels affixed to each openable electrical panel that quantified the hazard. Labels designated the proper personal protective equipment (PPE) required to ensure electricians performing energized work would be safe from potential arc events. The experience of one plant in deploying select new technologies to mitigate arc flash in areas where hazards were very high will be reviewed in detail. Site electrical upgrades resulted in enhanced safety along with an unexpected benefit; a significant improvement in production reliability. A follow-up project to increase the plant grinding capacity at the site outlines how new additions to the electrical infrastructure employed a “safety by design” approach to ensure arc flash safety.