Dräger, an international leader in the fields of medical and safety technology, has appointed Jennie Danton as Defence and Security Business Development Manager to strengthen its support for defence customers and help highlight how its technologies, national resilience capabilities and sector expertise can support operational readiness across defence.

Jennie previously served in the Royal Military Police (RMP). Since leaving the military, she has built a decade of industry experience and held a range of defence-focused commercial roles spanning submarine gas detection and monitoring systems, shipbuilding, and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology.

She joins Dräger’s Government team with a strong understanding of customer requirements, operational challenges and the wider defence landscape.

In her new role at Dräger, Jennie will focus on developing and growing Dräger’s presence within the UK defence sector. She will be responsible for identifying new opportunities, building strong relationships and helping customers better understand how Dräger’s technologies and expertise can support them. She will help position Dräger as a business, well equipped to respond to current and emerging needs, support operational readiness and national resilience across defence.

Jennie says she is excited by the opportunity to combine commercial growth with a clear sense of purpose:

“What drew me to Dräger was its focus on protection and survivability. The opportunity to build and shape the defence business for Dräger in the UK, bring new ideas on board and strengthen the foundations already in place is incredibly exciting.

“With my military background, it means a great deal to be able to help people understand the technologies available to protect them in some of the most challenging environments – whether that’s military operations, firefighting or responding to chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) threats. Knowing I can contribute to keeping people safe gives this role real purpose.”

Matt Evans, Head of Government for UK and Ireland Safety Division, who Jennie will report to, says Jennie is a valuable addition to the team:

“Jennie brings first-hand military experience and a strong commercial background across defence, safety and adjacent technologies. Her first-hand understanding of customer requirements, combined with her passion for protecting people in operational environments, will be a real asset as we continue to strengthen our support for defence customers and promote national resilience.”

www.draeger.com

The Enhanced Learning from Incidents (ELFi) project aims to understand and provide both insight and potential solutions to ensure lessons learned in one sector of society or industry help prevent injuries and accidents in another.

Each year, millions of workers worldwide lose their lives due to occupational accidents and work-related diseases, while millions more experience non-fatal work-related injuries. Despite decades of safety improvements, similar incidents continue to occur across industries, often because vital lessons remain locked in silos, delayed by legal processes or buried in technical reports.

The Thomas Ashton Institute (TAI), the University of Manchester (UoM), and EEMUA (the Engineering Equipment and Materials Users Association) today announce the start of the Enhanced Learning from Incidents (ELFi) project, a research initiative developed with the Hazards Forum and other industry partners to change this.

Considerable work has already been done on incident investigation, root cause analysis and formal safety assessment to enable specific parties to learn from incidents. However, events with common causes still occur. Industry and regulators increasingly recognise that the challenge is not simply identifying lessons, but ensuring that organisations see their relevance, link them to their own sites and operations, act on them effectively and embed the learning sustainably. This is especially true when incidents occur outside an organisation's own sector, or even apparently unrelated activity.

Drawing on TAI's and UoM’s rigorous analysis and specialist expertise, the project will:

• Analyse how incidents are reported, investigated, and shared across sectors
• Identify barriers and enablers to effective learning and cross-sector knowledge transfer, including siloed or inconsistent reporting systems and cultural resistance to disclosure
• Define best practice for incident reporting and sharing
• Develop a practical cross-sector learning framework, toolkit, and adoption roadmap
• Work with regulators, trade associations, industry bodies, and the Hazards Forum to support real-world adoption and a cultural shift towards proactive learning

The aim is to deliver practical guidance and pilot-tested tools that help industry learn faster and apply lessons more effectively, saving lives, protecting assets and reducing environmental harm.

"EEMUA is committed to standards that improve safety and help prevent accidents. Good practice on investigating incidents already exists, but the real challenge is helping operators recognise how a lesson from any industry applies to their own site, and then act on it. We look forward to working with TAI and inviting our members to engage with this project and help shape tools that work in practice."
Dr Stefan Kukula, Chief Executive, EEMUA

"Organisations rarely lack incident reports; what is often missing is a reliable way to recognise when a lesson from another sector applies to them, and to act on it before a similar event happens. By working alongside EEMUA, its members, regulators and safety professionals from the outset, we will build a strong evidence base and then co-design and pilot a framework and toolkit that turn incident data into contextualised, actionable learning across sectors."
Professor Martie van Tongeren, Deputy Director, Thomas Ashton Institute

"Most industries already investigate their incidents carefully, but those lessons rarely travel beyond the sector, or even the site, where they happened. Over the course of this initiative, we'll work with EEMUA members, regulators, and safety professionals to find out why, and co-design a framework and toolkit that are tested on real industry cases rather than on paper. We'd welcome organisations from any sector that want to help shape it."
Dr Saeed Reza Mohandes, Principal Investigator, University of Manchester

http://www.eemua.org/

Electrical and mechanical equipment aboard commercial vessels can operate in environments where flammable gases or vapours create a risk of fire or explosion. Tankers and vessels carrying certain hazardous cargoes require particularly careful control of equipment installed in classified areas. Shipboard engineers must understand how maintenance activities affect explosion protection while remaining prepared to respond to emergencies at sea. These responsibilities require both technical competence and an understanding of the vessel's safety procedures, particularly when equipment faults arise during a voyage.

Connect hazardous-area maintenance with maritime safety

Equipment maintenance in a hazardous area requires engineers to understand the conditions that could create an ignition source. Electrical inspections may involve checking enclosure integrity, cable entries, earthing arrangements and the condition of components used to maintain an equipment protection concept.

The International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) establishes minimum international training and competence requirements for seafarers. Relevant STCW courses  develop maritime safety and emergency-response skills that support engineers carrying out their duties aboard commercial vessels.

The convention is maintained by the International Maritime Organization , which establishes an international framework for seafarer competence. Engineers working on vessels with hazardous areas may require additional specialist qualifications appropriate to their technical duties, including training relevant to explosion-protected equipment.

This combination allows personnel to approach maintenance with an understanding of the equipment and the shipboard environment in which the work takes place.

Preserve explosion protection during maintenance

Explosion-protected equipment is designed to prevent ignition under specified operating conditions. Its protective properties can be compromised if maintenance changes the equipment's construction or allows environmental damage to affect critical components.

Engineers should inspect equipment according to the manufacturer's instructions and the applicable explosion-protection standards. Particular attention may be required where vibration, corrosion or repeated maintenance has affected the condition of enclosures and connections.

Replacement components must be suitable for the equipment's certification and intended use. Installing an unsuitable cable gland, modifying an enclosure or replacing a component without considering its protection concept can compromise the original design.

Maintenance records should document the condition of the equipment, work performed and any outstanding defects. This information helps the vessel's engineering team track deterioration and make informed decisions about future inspections.

Maintain control of hazardous-area work

Shipboard maintenance should be planned around the vessel's operating conditions and the potential presence of flammable atmospheres.

Work involving electrical equipment or other potential ignition sources may require specific permits, isolation arrangements and atmospheric testing. The appropriate controls depend on the vessel's hazardous-area classification, the nature of the work and its safety management procedures.

Coordination with the vessel's responsible officers is particularly important when maintenance could affect cargo operations or other activities involving flammable substances.

Prepare engineers for shipboard emergencies

An engineer working aboard a vessel may need to respond to an emergency involving equipment outside their immediate maintenance responsibilities. Fire, flooding or an incident involving hazardous cargo can require personnel to follow established emergency duties under difficult operating conditions.

An STCW basic safety training course  provides foundational preparation for these situations. The training covers personal survival techniques, fire prevention and firefighting, elementary first aid, and personal safety and social responsibilities.

These subjects are especially relevant to personnel whose normal duties involve machinery or electrical equipment. An engineer may recognise an equipment fault during routine maintenance but must also understand how to raise the alarm and respond safely if the situation develops into a wider shipboard emergency.

The training establishes a common foundation for emergency preparedness, while the vessel's safety management system defines the specific actions and responsibilities expected of individual crew members.

Connect equipment faults with emergency procedures

Hazardous-area maintenance and emergency planning should inform one another. A recurring equipment defect may indicate a deterioration mechanism that needs to be addressed before it creates a more serious problem.

Engineers should ensure that significant defects are reported through the vessel's established maintenance and safety procedures. Where an equipment failure could affect fire detection, ventilation or other protective systems, the implications for continued operation should be assessed before work proceeds.

Emergency exercises provide an opportunity to understand how technical failures could influence the crew's response. An engineer familiar with the vessel's electrical distribution and machinery arrangements can contribute useful information about equipment isolation and the restoration of essential services.

Maintain technical competence and emergency readiness together

Safe maintenance aboard vessels with hazardous areas depends on correctly maintained equipment, competent personnel and effective operational controls.

Engineers need to preserve the protective properties of equipment during maintenance while understanding their responsibilities within the vessel's emergency arrangements. Integrating technical inspections with maritime safety training and established reporting procedures helps crews identify developing hazards and respond appropriately when equipment problems affect shipboard safety.

Encapsulation protection, or “m”, is a protection technique used to prevent ignition in equipment for explosive atmospheres across oil and gas, mining and other industrial applications.

For over 10 years, manufacturers of encapsulated equipment for explosive atmospheres have worked to IEC 60079-18:2014 and its subsequent amendment. IEC 60079-18:2025, Edition 5.0, is the first full technical revision of the encapsulation “m” standard since then.

While the fundamental protection concept remains unchanged, Edition 5 introduces four Major Technical Changes. For manufacturers, the important question is not simply what has changed, but which changes could affect existing products, new designs and future certification.

Where are the significant changes?

The following areas deserve attention first because they include the Major Technical Changes and other changes with significant practical impact on the design and certification of encapsulated equipment.

Compound specification and curing

Edition 5 requires the curing method, temperature and duration to be included within the controlled compound specification.

This makes curing conditions an explicitly controlled part of the design and manufacturing process. Manufacturers should consider whether this information is already adequately captured within their controlled documentation. Where curing conditions are recorded elsewhere, documentation updates may be required.

Fault examination for “mc”

Edition 5 expressly applies the relevant separation-distance requirements to “mc”. Compact designs therefore cannot disregard these requirements simply because faults are generally not considered for “mc”.

Component fault treatment is also clarified. A component operating within its manufacturer ratings is treated as a countable fault, while operation outside those ratings is treated as a non-countable fault.

For compact “mc” equipment or designs relying on highly-stressed components, these provisions warrant particular attention.

Encapsulated switching contacts

The rated voltage and current specified by the switching-contact manufacturer must not be exceeded, while the housing around the arcing area is now termed the “arc chamber”.

For Level of Protection “ma”, the 60 V and 6 A limits must also be met under the applicable fault conditions specified by the standard. Manufacturers of “ma” equipment incorporating switching contacts should therefore verify the voltage and current under these conditions, rather than considering normal operating values alone.

Thermal calculations and battery systems

The previous edition included a note giving the thermal conductivity of air as 0.25 W/(m·K). This has been corrected to 0.025 W/(m·K).

Where the previous value was used to determine the hottest component or compound temperature, the calculation should be reviewed and, where necessary, recalculated.

Battery-powered equipment also receives additional attention.

The term “control device” is generally replaced by “safety device”, while Edition 5 introduces more explicit responsibilities where a Battery Management System provides a protection required by IEC 60079-18.

Evidence is required that the BMS remains functional under the expected relevant malfunctions. The equipment manufacturer should retain the appropriate supporting declaration from the BMS manufacturer and include information necessary to maintain the integrity of the protection within the product instructions.

Blocking diodes used to prevent reverse current are also subject to specified rating requirements.

What should manufacturers do now?

A structured gap assessment remains the clearest way to separate substantive technical gaps from changes with little practical impact, particularly for "mc" designs, "ma" switching contacts, and battery systems affected by the BMS provisions.

NMi ExVeritas carries out these assessments for encapsulated equipment manufacturers, mapping Edition 5 requirements against existing designs and documentation ahead of transition and certification deadlines.

https://www.exveritas.com/

In industries such as oil and gas, chemical processing, mining, energy, food and beverage, and material handling, measurement equipment is often required to operate where flammable gases, vapors, or combustible dust may be present. In these environments, selecting the right sensor is not only about measurement performance. It is also part of the overall safety strategy.

Intrinsic safety is an explosion-protection method that limits the electrical and thermal energy available within a circuit, helping prevent the ignition of a potentially explosive atmosphere. When properly installed with an approved intrinsic safety barrier, an intrinsically safe ultrasonic sensor can provide non-contact level and distance measurement within hazardous areas.

This makes ultrasonic sensing particularly useful for applications such as monitoring flammable liquid levels in tanks, measuring material levels, detecting objects or equipment position, and monitoring distance on process equipment. Because ultrasonic sensors operate without contacting the target material, they can also reduce exposure of the sensor to corrosive, abrasive, or otherwise difficult materials.

Migatron Corporation designs and manufactures intrinsically safe ultrasonic sensors for hazardous area applications. The RPS-409A-IS2 carries ANZEx, ATEX, IECEx, and C-UL-US approvals and is designed for use in mines susceptible to firedamp (Group 1 protection level Ma), and in hazardous gas and dust environments, including Zones 0, 1, 2, 20, 21, and 22 and Class I, II, and III locations when used with an approved intrinsic safety barrier(s). The RPS-429A-IS also offers ATEX, IECEx, and C-UL-US approvals, with 4–20 mA current-loop or 1–5 V analog output options.

As automation expands into hazardous environments, safe and reliable measurement becomes increasingly important. Migatron also works directly with OEMs and engineers to develop customized ultrasonic sensing solutions tailored to specific application and integration requirements.

http://www.migatron.com/

Once operational, the facility will generate up to 60 GWh of renewable energy annually, enough to meet the energy requirements of approximately 11,700 households or 30,000 residents.

The plant will process up to 75,000 tonnes of organic waste each year, including separately collected household biowaste from Colmenar Viejo and surrounding municipalities. Rather than being sent to landfill, the organic material will be converted into renewable biomethane.

At the heart of the facility will be three stainless-steel digesters supplied by WELTEC BIOPOWER. Each digester measures 25.34 metres in diameter and 10.05 metres in height, with a capacity of 5,067 cubic metres. A gas-tight pre-storage tank will help maintain a continuous substrate supply and stable operating conditions.

“Stainless steel is particularly resistant to corrosion under the demanding biological and chemical conditions found in the digestion process. This gives the plant a long service life, high operational reliability and low maintenance requirements,” said Alain Priser, International Sales Manager at WELTEC BIOPOWER.

The facility will operate as a closed and sealed system, with biofilters and activated carbon systems designed to remove up to 99% of odorous substances from exhaust air. The resulting biomethane will be injected directly into the gas grid.

The project is expected to contribute to Madrid's efforts to reduce landfill use while converting regional organic waste into locally produced renewable energy.

WELTEC BIOPOWER will provide further information about the technology at stand 276A at Salon del Gas Renovable in Valladolid, 29–30 September 2026.

ABB has expanded its industrial emissions measurement portfolio with the launch of the PFM 20 Ex, a new dust monitoring device developed for use in hazardous and harsh industrial environments.

Designed for applications where robust equipment and low-range measurement are essential, the PFM 20 Ex provides a certified dust detection range down to 7.5 mg/m³ and meets ATEX Zone 22 certification requirements.

The new device extends ABB’s dust monitoring capabilities and forms part of the company’s wider industrial emissions measurement offering, which includes continuous emissions monitoring, particulate analysis, dust and gas flow measurement and portable hydrocarbon detection.

The launch also builds on the measurement technologies added to ABB’s portfolio following its acquisition of Födisch Group in 2024. The acquisition expanded ABB’s capabilities in dust and gas flow measurement as well as portable hydrocarbon detection.

By bringing these technologies together, ABB says industrial operators can source a broader range of emissions measurement solutions from a single supplier, helping to simplify supplier coordination and provide a more consistent approach to selecting, deploying and supporting measurement equipment across industrial facilities.

“The PFM 20 Ex is an important product launch in its own right, giving customers high-sensitivity dust monitoring for hazardous environments,” said Jean-Rene Roy, Global Business Line Manager at ABB’s Measurement & Analytics division.

“This also represents a significant addition to our highly capable industrial emission measurement portfolio, enabling us to support a broader range of customer needs, from continuous gas analysis to dust, gas flow and portable measurement.”

ABB’s industrial emissions measurement portfolio includes continuous emission monitoring systems such as the ACF5000 and MCA 10 CEMS, alongside particulate analysers including the PFM 20, PFM 13 and OPM 19 ED dust analysers. The range also incorporates the FMD 09 gas flow analyser and portable Flame Ionisation Detectors (FIDs) for real-time, on-site hydrocarbon detection.

The measurement technologies are supported by remote and on-site service capabilities and flexible care agreements. ABB’s My Measurement Assistant+ (MMA+) also provides users with access to device health information, reports, documentation and AI-powered device-specific knowledge and support.

With the addition of the PFM 20 Ex, ABB is extending its ability to support industrial operators requiring dust and emissions monitoring technologies suitable for demanding and potentially hazardous operating environments.