The Mid-Michigan Section of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) invites the public to a special presentation.

The group is committed to providing a safe and healthy environment for all meeting attendees. In light of the impact of the coronavirus, all meetings will be held virtually until further notice. The next meeting will feature an address by Mary Beth Mulcahy, "Chemical Security: Protecting Chemicals from People," from noon to 1 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 16.

Chemical safety aims to prevent an accidental release of hazardous materials or energy, while chemical security addresses the prevention and control of threats that have the potential to result in unauthorized access, loss, theft, misuse, diversion or intentional release of hazardous materials or energy. Stated more simply, chemical safety aims to protect people from chemicals while chemical security aims to protect chemicals from people. Is this seminar, Mulcahy will provide a brief introduction to chemical weapons, introduce basic chemical security concepts, and examine a toxic release described in a U.S. Chemical Safety Board report through a chemical security lens.

Mulcahy is an R&D S&E, systems research and analysis professional in the Global Chemical and Biological Security (GCBS) program and a causal analyst with the Environmental Safety & Health (ES&H) Performance Assurance Occurrence Management team at Sandia National Laboratories. As part of GCBS, Mulcahy works with an interdisciplinary team to engage global partners for the identification and integration of technical solutions in chemical security and safety. Her work with ES&H includes performing casual analysis of safety incidents and near-misses to support Sandia's goal of continual safety learning.

In additional, Mulcahy serves as the editor-in-chief of the American Chemical Society's ACS Chemical Health & Safety journal which focuses on publishing high-quality articles of interest to scientists, EH&S professionals, and non-research personnel who manage or work in areas where chemicals are used or hazardous waste is generated.

Previously, Mulcahy worked for nine years as a chemical incident investigator with the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB), an independent federal agency that determines the root causes of major chemical accidents in the United States. At the CSB, Mulcahy investigated accidents in a variety of settings; a five-worker fatality on an onshore oil rig blowout, a dust explosion at a corn milling facility in Wisconsin that killed five workers and injured 14 others, an 11-fatatilty offshore oil drilling rig (Deepwater Horizon), a 14-fatality ammonium nitrate explosion, a university laboratory, as well as explosions at a food and power plants.

Mulcahy earned her Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of Colorado in Boulder. After graduate school, she completed a postdoctoral fellowship funded by the National Science Foundation at the Instituto Balseiro in Bariloche, Argentina, and then spent time doing research for a biotechnology company before joining the CSB.

The lecture qualifies for one continuing education hour. CEH certificates are needed for licensed Professional Engineers to maintain their license and certificates will be provided to interested attendees.

For seminar call-in information, email Pranav Karanjkar at pranav.karanjkar@dow.com.

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Mid-Michigan AIChE to host presentation on chemical security Feb. 16 - Midland Daily News