Process safety system suppliers are experiencing strong growth due to the increased awareness, understanding and adoption of safety system standards coupled with more demand from manufacturers who are expanding operations in China and India.
According to a new ARC Advisory Group study, "Safety and Critical Control System Worldwide Outlook – Market Analysis and Forecast Through 2010," the global market was over $920 million in 2005 and is forecasted to expand at compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of over 10 percent annually to over $1.5 billion by 2010.
“Safety systems have been a buoyant market for the last two years. Increased demand for oil and gas, due to the economic growth of China and India along with the other BRIC countries, is fueling investments in oil and gas production and in refining, leading to increased demand for safety systems,” according to ARC vice president Asish Ghosh, the principal author of the study.
The report noted that a large portion of the current basic control system suppliers (BPCS), such as ABB, General Electric, Honeywell, Invensys, Rockwell Automation, Siemens, and Yokogawa, are also becoming well established as process safety instrumented system (SIS) suppliers. Those SIS suppliers not in the BPCS business include HIMA and ICS Triplex. New companies entering market include Emerson, RTP, and MTL.
Certain geographic regions offer more opportunities for the SIS market than others, the report said. The largest market for safety systems is in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Although the North American market is decreasing, the Asian market, led by China and India, is showing a rapid increase.
However, in Japan, due to their continued use of relays or solid-state logic systems for safety protection, the market remains small for programmable safety systems.
As manufacturers throughout the world become more knowledgeable about general safety standards (IEC 61508) and process safety standards (IEC 61511 and ANSI/ISA-84.00.01), they are seeking cost-effective safety systems. This has led to an increase in demand for SIL 2 systems at the expense of SIL 3 systems, the study concluded.