Industrial Safety constitutes a cross-cutting field of knowledge which provides an important added value in all European industry sectors, especially with the aim to develop sustainable technologies and products.
ETPIS, with its vision adopted in 2005, supports the implementation of the EU2020 Strategy applying the following principles:

• The change in the values of the society towards more safety, environment friendliness and sustainability is an opportunity to develop new products, new services and new activities.
• Pro-active attitudes with the development of safer and cleaner products and processes right from the beginning directly contribute to sustainable development. This has to be accompanied in the regulatory framework which also has to be compatible with innovation in the industry. Europe cannot afford to have regulations lagging behind innovation. 
• In a lot of situations, quick progress can be achieved by implementing the best practices or solutions already existing. Therefore, sharing of best practices between industry sectors, between Member States and between Communities and focus on the implementation of existing knowledge may bring great and quick benefits.
• The European governance of emerging risks related to innovation (e.g. massive use of nano-particles in the industry, adoption of new energy carriers…) has to be updated to give more flexibility while ensuring a high level of protection of the citizens. This reduces also the time to market as demonstrated by the iNTeg-Risk project (http://www.integrisk.eu-vri.eu). Goal-based regulations supported by effective standards should be therefore promoted. 
• Changes in the society have to be carried out with the support of all stakeholders. The dialogue and participation of the interested parties should be maintained. Therefore, the links with the professional associations and federations, trade unions and with the scientific organizations are very important.
• The European solutions have to be developed and implemented in an international context because most of the societal challenges faced by Europe are not only European challenges but most of the time they are global. Then the solutions developed need to be elaborated in partnership with other international teams. In this context, common projects with the USA, Japan, China, India, Latin America… are strategic.

To learn more on the SafeFuture Initiative you can download the description of the “SafeFuture Approach” (20 pages document).
You can also visit the page of the SafeFuture Workshop that launched the initiative on December 8, 2010 in Brussels (see agenda and the presentations). This workshop enabled ETPIS to collect demands from several industry sectors and stakeholders.

In order to implement the SafeFuture initiative and include as much as possible the view from ETPIS Active Members and other key stakeholders, such as other Technology Platforms, networks and association, you are invited:

• To submit your comments on the general approach, using the Consultation Form
• To submit topics to be included in the SafeFuture implementation document under preparation (to input the Horizon 2020 programme), using the Topic Form

The forms have to be sent to info@industrialsafety-tp.org.

Industrial safety performance progressively and measurably improved in terms of reduction of reportable accidents at work, occupational diseases, environmental incidents and accident-related production losses. “Incident elimination” and “learning from failures” cultures embedded in design, maintenance and operation at all levels in enterprises. Structured self-regulated safety programs in all major industry sectors in all European countries. Measurable performance targets for accident elimination and accident free mind set workplaces as the norm in Europe.

The initiative “SafeFuture - Safe innovation for a competitive and sustainable future” is organized around 4 pillars that will bring innovative and sustainable solutions to the European Grand Challenges the 4 pillars:

• Safe Infrastructure, to address e.g.: life extension of process plants, transport infrastructures, power plants, off-shore platforms…; intensification of natural catastrophes due to climate change; design and monitoring for long term operation for Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS); monitoring, protection and security of critical infrastructures…
• Safe Energy, to address e.g.: safety of the use of new energy carriers for vehicles (FEV, fuel cells, CNG, biofuels…); safety for the green energy technologies (wind mills, photovoltaic panels, concentrating solar power (CSP)…); making the underground transport infrastructure compatible with the new energy carriers; combining pan European transport infrastructures and smart high power electricity grids…
• Safe Products and Production, to address e.g.: development of the European Factory of the Future, by managing emerging risks through new integrated solutions (safety systems, advanced personal protective equipments, new organizational models, ergonomics, etc.); enabling higher productivity under better workplaces; safety for the green jobs; safe production and use of nanomaterials…
• Transversal issues, to solve existing challenges for sustainable integration, interaction and risk governance such as: difficulties in putting together different risk mitigation policies and ensuring their compatibility (Risk-Risk trade-offs), Multi-risk and interdependencies of risks in a global competitive market…