WEST LAFAYETTE – A Purdue University researcher has proposed development of a new cross-disciplinary approach for analyzing and preventing systemic failures in complex systems that play a role in calamities from power blackouts to the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster and the subprime mortgage crisis.

            “The striking similarities in such catastrophes necessitate a broader perspective to better understand such failures,” said Venkat Venkatasubramanian, a professor of chemical engineering. “In the history of system failures, a few disasters have served as wake-up calls. The Flixborough chemical plant accident in the United Kingdom in 1974, where a Nypro UK plant explosion killed 26 people was one such call.”

            Venkatasubramanian said, “We must study all disasters from a common systems engineering perspective so that one can thoroughly understand the commonalities as well as the differences in order to better design and control such systems in the future. Typically, system failures occur due to fragility in complex systems.

            “Modern technological advances are creating a rapidly increasing number of complex engineered systems, processes and products, which pose considerable challenges in ensuring their proper design, analysis, control, safety and management for successful operation over their life cycles.”

            Venkatasubramanian said that often the responsibility for an accident rests with the top levels of company management and a poor corporate culture regarding safety. Details of his study appear in the January 2011 issue of AlChE Journal.