Functional Safety Engineering

Functional safety is the structured approach to reducing risk by ensuring safety-related control systems perform their required safety functions when demanded. Governed by standards such as IEC 61508, IEC 61511, ISO 13849 and AS 4024, it applies across both process plants and machinery-based systems.

At BSE Australia, we support clients across the full safety lifecycle — from hazard and risk assessment through to design, verification, validation and ongoing management.

Process Functional Safety (IEC 61511)
SIS and SIF design, SIL determination and verification, Safety Requirement Specifications (SRS), cause & effect development, and proof testing for high-risk process environments.

Machine Safety (ISO 13849 / AS 4024)
Machinery risk assessments, Performance Level (PL) determination, safety circuit design, validation, and integration of safety relays and safety PLCs.

We are pragmatic in our approach — designing systems that achieve required safety integrity without unnecessary complexity, over-engineering, or restrictions that compromise production performance and throughput.

Our certified functional safety professionals combine standards-based methodology with practical industrial experience to deliver compliant, robust and operationally efficient safety solutions.

Our Functional Safety Capabilities

• Independent Safety Reviews
  Structured third-party assessment of safety functions, documentation, and lifecycle compliance aligned with IEC 61511 and ISO 13849.
• SIL Determination & Verification
  Facilitated workshops and calculations (including LOPA-based methods) to determine and validate required Safety Integrity Levels.
• Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA)
  Quantitative evaluation of safeguards to confirm adequate risk reduction and identify gaps or over-design.
• Risk & Hazard Analysis
  HAZOP participation, risk matrices, risk graphs, and structured hazard assessments to define credible failure scenarios and mitigation pathways.
• Safety Instrumented System (SIS) Design
  Design, implementation, and verification of IEC 61511-aligned SIS for process protection, interlocks, and emergency shutdown systems.
• Safety PLC & Control System Integration
  Specification, configuration, and validation of safety-related control systems using certified safety PLCs, relays, and architectures.

Our Approach

We take a practical, risk-informed approach to functional safety, combining standards compliance with real-world operational understanding.

We do not over-engineer systems or introduce unnecessary restrictions that reduce production throughput. Our objective is to achieve the required risk reduction in the simplest, most practical manner possible, ensuring safety supports operations rather than obstructs them.