Target 2030
Rate of high‑severity process safety incidents (High Severity Process Safety Incidents, hsPSI) worldwide
≤ 0.10
Sustainability
Process Safety
Process safety is a central element of safe, efficient, and responsible production. It plays an essential role in preventing safety-related and environmental impacts by systematically reducing risks and ensuring the long-term safe and reliable operation of our plants. Through comprehensive safety concepts, continuous improvements, and stringent risk management across the entire lifecycle of our plants. We contribute to protecting the environment as well as the people in the communities at our production sites and provide a safe and healthy working environment for all who work in the interest of BASF within its area of responsibility worldwide, no matter whether they are BASF or leased employees, contractors or guests at BASF sites.
Our leadership exemplifies this commitment and fosters a culture of continuous development in which our employees know and understand their roles and responsibilities for safe plant operation and consistently perform them correctly and completely. This requires sound knowledge and a deep understanding of their responsibilities in plant operation, as well as the hazards posed by chemicals and processes.
Process Safety is dedicated to:
• Identifying the hazards and assessing the risks associated with the materials and their physical and chemical properties, chemical processes and operating conditions, and process equipment
• Controlling these risks in order to prevent the consequences of loss of control of toxic, reactive, flammable chemicals, or energy
The Process Hazard Analysis (PHA) is a systematic safety review to identify, assess, and control process hazards. For capital projects, a stepwise safety, health and environmental protection (SHE) review leads to the development of a SHE concept and its Implementation Check (IC). For existing plants, a PHA is conducted as a Process safety review, consisting of a Plant Safety Concept (PSC) revalidation and the verification of its Implementation Check.
Management programs integrate process safety principles into daily operations. This includes the review and updating of safety-relevant plant information, the validation of operating instructions, regular safety reviews, MOC processes, comprehensive training programs, incident investigation and communication, and measures to ensure asset integrity. Furthermore, our plants are subject to Responsible Care audits and process safety management reviews, which ensure continuous improvement.
High‑Severity KPIs at BASF
In 2023, BASF introduced a company‑wide strategic focus on preventing high‑severity process safety incidents. The aim of this realignment is to systematically reduce risks by consistently avoiding events that could have significant impacts on people, the environment, and assets.
This shift enables more effective resource allocation and strengthens internal governance and control mechanisms within safety management. Event‑based learning is being systematically embedded to ensure that safety‑relevant insights are consistently incorporated into operational decision‑making. At the same time, hazard awareness is further reinforced across all organizational levels.
As part of this strategic development, ahigh‑severity KPI for process safety (hsPSI, high‑severity Process Safety Incident) were introduced. The KPI measures high‑severity process safety events using a rate‑based methodology (incidents per 200,000 working hours) and serves as a binding steering metric across the Group. The global target value is 0.10 by 2030.
Latest figures in the BASF Online Report.
