A multicriteria knapsack approach to economic optimization of industrial safety measures

The selection of safety measures to be applied in an industrial plant to reduce risk to an acceptable level is a critical task for safety engineers. However, to select a portfolio of safety measures is quite hard as a number of different hazards have to be counteracted simultaneously and a wide range of preventive or protective measures can be chosen, including either technical, administrative and managerial actions, within the constraints of a given budget. In this paper a multi-criteria “knapsack” model is described to help safety analysts in selecting the most cost-effective safety measures to be adopted. The problem is formulated as that of maximizing the utility of the portfolio of safety measures subject to a number of constraints including a maximum allowable budget. In the paper at first the problem formulation is given as a knapsack model, then the approach to compute the utility level of a given portfolio of safety measure is described utilizing a multi-criteria method. Finally, an application example is presented and the advantages and disadvantages of the method are discussed.

• We present a methodology for optimal choice of safety measures in industrial plants.
• A knapsack linear programming model allows utility maximization.
• An optimal portfolio of safety measures complying with a limited budget is obtained.
• The method allows quick multiple-criteria ranking for decision making.
• It can be easily utilized by practitioners using spreadsheet software.