Hot Work Permit

Last Updated on June 12, 2024 | Permit Management

A stray spark. Multiple operations in the same area. Inattentive workers.

There are so many reasons why accidents happen in a plant due to ignition. Every year, thousands of fire incidents are recorded causing loss of human lives and damages to properties. Most of these incidents are due to the ignorant behavior or inadequate knowledge on the part of workers that can be avoided with a few precautions.

To create a safe working space, you require a strong system that overlooks the various activities going on in the plants - a permit-based solution that enforces the workers to follow a set of rules for their safety.

This is where a hot work permit comes in.

Table of contents:

What is a Hot Work Permit?
Why Do You Need a Hot Work Permit?
How Does a Hot Work Permit Work?
What Should a Typical Hot Work Permit Consist Of?
Hot Work Permit Template

What is a Hot Work Permit?

A hot work permit is a legal document that is required in certain situations where work is being performed that may generate heat, sparks, or flames. This type of work can include welding, flame cutting, grinding, soldering, brazing and other activities that have the potential to cause fires or explosions.

While these are some of the common hot works we come across, there are a lot more such activities that require a hot work permit.

A hot work permit protects the people involved in any hot work activity from gross accidents. It is basically a Permit to Work system with exhaustive list for all possible hot works with a step-by-step checklist or template for safe operations.

A hot work permit is both a preventive and an educative system to help workers to be safe when working with ignition. Every worker should obtain a hot work permit and follow the steps before, during and after conducting any hot work.

Why Do You Need a Hot Work Permit?

Let’s imagine a situation where a group of workers hasn’t obtained a hot work permit for a welding job. They can risk starting a fire, causing burns, excessive noise that can affect the work nearby and harm anyone in the vicinity.

This is from just a single activity on a typical day. When you consider the multiple hot works happening in oil and gas industry at a given time without any protocol or preventive measures in place, it can lead to colossal damages.

Without a hot work permit, a plant is vulnerable to hazards due to sparks, molten metals, flammable materials nearby, hot substances, explosions due to the trapped gases, or respiratory issues due to fumes in closed spaces.

Every hot work is dangerous in some way. A hot work permit identifies the trouble areas where things could go wrong and guides them to take preventive measures to safeguard themselves and those around them.

A hot work permit significantly reduces the risk of fire hazards. Apart from making permit management easier, a hot work permit will ensure that the workers:

Follow all isolation practices before starting any job.
Test for flammable substances or gases in the area of the job.
Identify the hazardous substances and take precautions to keep them out of the way.
Follow all PPE instructions.
Cordon-off the area where the hot work will be conducted.
Be aware of various ignition sources.
Eliminate any ignition sources in the vicinity before beginning the hot work.
Use supplementary materials like sand and blankets to protect themselves and other surrounding areas during the job.
Monitor the surroundings and O2 levels during the hot work.
Have first-aid boxes and fire extinguishers handy.
Inspect and clean up the area after completing the hot work.
Follow protocols for incident reporting.

How Does a Hot Work Permit Work?

When an employee wants to conduct any hot work job, the person should obtain the hot work permit from the project manager or from the relevant department. If two or more subcontractors are performing hot work on a single project, every one of them should obtain an individual hot work permit.

Usually the Risk Management or Fire Prevention department handles the permits for hot work. This can differ from plant to plant. The employee should fill out the complete details of the hot work, its location and the exact nature of the job.

The responsible department will approve the permit, or send it back for edits or information. This permit will have a particular permit number as reference.

Once approved, the employee can carry out the hot work with the permit posted at the site for the entire duration of the job. The workers can refer the hot work permit checklist for precautions and steps to follow.

Once the job is done, they’ll need to submit the completed permit to the project manager.

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What Should a Typical Hot Work Permit Consist Of?

A hot work permit must consist of:

The date
The location of the job
The duration of the job
The exact nature of hot work
Hazards and risks of the job
PPE requirements
Details of the person applying the permit and approving the permit
Requirements for conducting the hot work monitoring and fire monitoring protocols
Hot work checklist before starting the job
Hot work protocols for jobs in confined spaces and walls/ceilings
Final checkup after the job
Handover procedures and cancellation protocols

Hot Work Permit Template

While a hot work permit can protect the workers from accidents, it can be quite tedious when the permit system is completely offline. You can save a lot of time and quicken the approval process when you use an online hot work permit checklist.

At Safetymint, we have several pre-built permit to work templates. You can customize any of these templates to create a digitized permit system. With our solution, all of the hot work permit checklists can be filled, approved, accessed and edited online.