Safety Analysis of Process Industry System Based on Complex Networks Theory

In this paper, we introduce a new method for safety analysis of process industry systems based on recent advances in complex networks. We model the process industry system as a large, complex network and study its topological properties, and then we investigate the cascading failures by constructing a simple model incorporating the loads on nodes and the efficiency of network. We use the Tennessee eastman process (TEP) as a case to illustrate our work. We find the industry system network is an inhomogeneous network and has a high clustering coefficient and a small average path length, which is different from random networks and regular networks. We also find that an initial failure of a device of the system can generate a cascading failure, if the devices have extremely high initial load. The method can help to identify the critical components of the process industry system and can also be available for failure prevention and design safety control system.