Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Process Safety and Environmental Protection

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/psep

A set theory-based model for safety investment and accident control

in coal mines
Fu-chuan Jiang b,∗ , En Lai a , Yu-xuan Shan b , Fu-hao Tang b , Hu-gang Li b
a
Institute of Safety Science and Engineering, South China University of Technology, China
b
College of Safety Science and Engineering, Liaoning Technical University, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Mechanization and automation of the coal industry as well as increasing the government support for
Received 2 December 2019 safety in coal mines in China resulted in a significant decrease in the death rate per million tons of
Received in revised form 23 January 2020 coal produced. Nonetheless, major accidents still occur. As one of the five factors of safe production,
Accepted 3 February 2020
safety investment plays a key role in ensuring the safe production of coal in mining enterprises. Coal
Available online 5 February 2020
mining enterprises can ensure safe production in the mines and maximize profits through optimum safety
investment. In this study, safety system engineering principles and subsets in set theory were combined
Keywords:
to develop a novel safety investment index system. The safety investment indices were categorized
Coal mine
Accident
into human, machine, environment, and the intersection of these three indices. The elements in each
Safety investment set were examined, and a multivariate model of safety investment and accident control was
Safety investment created using gray forecasting theory. In addition, a case study was conducted to validate the reliability of
Gray forecasting method the model. The results indicated that the proposed model can provide theoretical evidence and guidance
for safety investment decision making in coal mining enterprises.
© 2020 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Analytic Hierarchy Process (TIFNs-AHP), MDC-TIFLNs-AHP, and

In China, the current production and consumption of primary
energy from coal, petroleum, natural gas, and other sources are
approximately 75 %, 17 %, 2 %, and 6 %, respectively (Zheng et al.,
2016). Therefore, coal remains a dominant and irreplaceable source
of energy in China. In recent years, the safety conditions in the
Chinese coal mines have been improved, which is reflected in the
accident rate and death toll decline. However, the coal industry
in China is still among the high-risk industries compared to other
developed countries (Xianping et al., 2014). Safety investment is
crucial for safe production, as it is one of the five factors, culture,
law, duty, investment, and technology, of safe production in coal
mines. Thus, formulating a reasonable safety investment scheme is
a key step in safe production management and a major approach to
mining accident control that should be implemented by coal mining
enterprises.
Safety investment has been extensively investigated by Chi-
nese scholars. For example, Chengyi et al. (2011a; Baofu et al.,
2016a, 2016b) thoroughly examined safety investment by coal
mining enterprises using Triangular Intuitionistic Fuzzy Numbers-
∗ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: 1047074832@qq.com (F.-c. Jiang).
G-INFNs-MCGDM methods. Hongjun et al. (Hongjun et al., 2006;
Roy and Gupta, 2019) created a nonlinear optimization model for
safety investment. Ren et al. (Son et al., 2000; Haizhi et al., 2014)
established a safety investment optimization model that aims to
minimize the overall safety investment expenditure of coal min-
ing enterprises. Shuicheng et al. (2007) developed an optimization
model for safety investment and output.
Safety investment is characterized by retardation and invis-
ibility (Genserik et al., 2016). Therefore, corporate leaderships
often overlook the importance of a reasonable safety investment
scheme in limiting accidents. This study examined the associations
between safety investment and accident control and developed a
theoretical model reflecting their relationship. Thus, it can provide
theoretical evidence and guidance for coal mining enterprises to
formulate reliable safety investment plans.
Coal mining is a complex system, and hence it shall be exam-
ined with the principle of safety system engineering to meet the
requirements for complex system investigation. The application of
set theory can ensure the overall plan of safety investment. In this
study, a set approach was applied in the frame of system engineer-
ing to develop a novel safety investment index system. To achieve
this, the data of real investments by coal mining enterprises were
collected and categorized based on the investment indices. Finally,
a gray forecasting theory was used to process the accident index

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psep.2020.02.003
0957-5820/© 2020 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
254 F.-c. Jiang et al. / Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258
Fig. 1. Subsets of safety investment.
data and create a model for safety investment and accident con-
trol. The proposed model can be used by coal mining enterprises as
a reference to aid planning of the safety investment.
2. Compilation of safety investment indices
A safety investment index system must comprehensively and
systematically reflect the various characteristics of safety invest-
ment. Chinese scholars have examined varying degrees of safety
investment indices. For example, Chen et al. (Chen and Liu, 2004;
Yuetong et al., 2019) proposed 23 indices in seven major categories
grouped according to investment purposes as well as 12 indices cat-
egorized according to macro and micro perspectives. Chen (2020)
suggested 17 indices classified into three levels: people flow, mate-
rial flow, and information flow. Wang, He, and Wang (Wang et al.,
2009; Ma et al., 2016; Lu et al., 2016) categorized safety investment
indices into six major categories after performing cluster analysis.
These studies provided different index combinations and systems
at different levels and in various dimensions. Following the results
of these studies, a system of safety investment index set was created
using set theory.
According to the safety system engineering theory, the objects of
safety investment shall include the following subsystems: people,
machines, and environment systems. Each subsystem includes dis-
tinctive parts and parts that interact with or are relevant to those
from other subsystems. According to the set theory, the separate
and interactive parts were divided into three independent subsets
and a dependent subset, respectively. This classification method
was adopted to divide safety investment into four subsets for an
in-depth analysis, as illustrated in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1 shows that the safety investment index system com-
prises the following sets: I-human subset, II-machine subset,
III-environment subset, and IV-an intersection subset of the
aforementioned three sets. The intersection subset (IV) is com-
posed of human-machine intersection IV(a) , human-environment
intersection IV (b) ; machine-environment intersection IV(c) ; and
human-machine-environment intersection IV(d) . The four sets
were deemed as secondary indices of the safety investment index
system. The final object of safety investments was considered the
primary principle of safety investment, and hence elements of all
subsets (i.e., tertiary indices of the system) were analyzed based
on the data accessibility and practical significance of the indices as
follows:
(1) Human subset elements: The following items should be
provided: special funds for employing safety professional;
additional safety insurance for miners; safety education and
training for employees; occupational disease check-ups and
other medical services for the employees working in the mines
for extended periods; and rewards for employees adhering to
safety operating procedures. Therefore, the safety investment
elements of the human subset were summarized as invest-
ments in  1 employment of safety professionals;  2 safety
education;  3 safety insurance; 
4 medical services; and 5 per-
formance awards.
(2) Machine subset elements: Machine investment plays an impor-
tant role in ensuring production safety. Coal mining enterprises,
therefore, shall purchase safety equipment and conduct peri-
odical repairs and maintenance. At the end of their lifetime,
equipment must be replaced. Hence, the safety investment
elements of the machine subset shall be divided into invest-
ments in  1 equipment purchase;  2 equipment replacement;  3
equipment repair;  4 equipment maintenance; and  5 obsolete
equipment removal.
(3) Environment subset elements: Lighting, work noises, dust, toxic
substances, temperature, and other microenvironments are key
factors affecting the safe production in the mines. Therefore,
safety investment elements of the environment subset shall
comprise the investments in  1 lighting arrangement;  2 noise
control;  3 dust removal;  4 toxic substance elimination; and
5 microenvironment regulation.
(4) Intersection subset elements: The intersection subsets were
categorized into human-machine, human-environment,
machine-environment, and human-machine-environment
intersections. Human-machine intersection investment is
intended to enhance the level of human-machine interaction
and ensure that machines work according to the opera-
tion habits of the users. The safety investment elements of
the human-machine intersection subset shall include the
optimization of  1 human-machine contact, i.e., interface
of equipment (such as lever) that requires manual opera-
tion; 2 human-machine interface, i.e., interactive interfaces
between human and machine (such as dashboard);  3 operat-
ing procedures to reduce redundant steps; and  4 comfort of
human-machine interactions, which include the optimization
of machines to run according to the physiologic characteris-
tics, behaviors, and habits of the users. Human-environment
investment intersection aims to ensure workplace safety. In
the mines, the safety of workers is significantly influenced
by lighting, noises, dust, temperature, humidity, and other
microenvironments. Thus, the safety investment elements
of the human-environment intersection subset shall include
precautions against  1 lighting abnormalities; 2 excessively
high noise levels;  3 dust levels beyond upper limits; and  4
microenvironmental abnormalities. The machine-environment
investment intersection focuses on improving the applicability
of machines in the service environments and shall include
the following elements  1 improvement of the applicability
of machines operating underground at high temperatures;  2
reduction of machine erosion in underground mining settings;
3 prevention of the machine aging caused by exposure to
underground mining conditions; and  4 enhancement of
equipment durability in mining-induced earthquakes or other
disasters. Human-machine-environment investment intersec-
tion involves the whole enterprise, as it aims to improve the
safety management levels. Therefore, the safety investment
elements of the human-machine-environment intersection
subset shall include the investments in the buildups of  1 a
corporate safety cultural system;  2 a corporate safety inspec-
tion system;  3 a corporate emergency response system; and

4 a plant-wide information command system.
 F.-c. Jiang et al. / Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258 255

Fig. 2. Index of safety investment.

The proposed safety investment index system is illustrated in The parameters a and u were obtained through manipulation of
Fig. 2. the matrix. The solution for the first-order differential equation is
as follows:

u
p1 − u⁄a e−ak +
3. Application of gray forecasting theory (1) (1)
p̂k+1 = (3)
a
3.1. Fundamentals of gray forecasting theory
(1) (0)
where p1 = p1 and in the Eq. (3), the k is the time series from 1
Gray forecasting theory can identify significant regularities in to 8.
irregular, disorderly, or slightly variable raw data. The theory (1)
p̂k+1 was inversely accumulated and restored to obtain forecast-
offers predictions of the accident trends in coal mining enterprises ing values of the raw data, which can be expressed as follows:
through gray system modeling, correlation, residual identification,
and a first-order differential equation of (GM (1,1)) (Hosse René (0) (1) (1)
et al., 2016). p̂k+1 =p̂k+1 − p̂k (4)
The procedure used is described below.
When original discrete data were present, P(0) = {P1 (0) , P2 (0) , ···,
3.2. Forecast of casualty rate per thousand people in a coal
Pn (0) }, where n is the length of the time series, which is successively
mining enterprise
accumulated to produce P1) = {P1 (1), P2 (1), ···, Pn (1)}. Eq. (1) is the
first-order gray differential equation, which was developed based
The gray forecasting theory was applied to develop a forecasting
on the accumulated time series:
model of safety investment and accident control based on the safety
investment data and casualty rate per thousand people in a coal
dp(1) mining enterprise over an eight-year period. It was conducted by
+ ap(1) = u (1)
dt processing the data of highly variable casualty rate per thousand
people, which is one of accident statistical indices.
where a, u are the pending parameters. Table 1 shows the casualty rates per thousand people in the
The following parameter vectors
⎡ were formulated:⎤
⎡ (0) ⎤ (1) (1)
selected coal mining enterprise over eight years.
p −(p2 + p1 ) 1 1) The gray forecasting equation for the casualty rate per thou-
  2
⎢ p(0) ⎥ ⎢ 2 ⎥
⎢ 3 ⎥ ⎢ ⎥ sand people:
, yn = ⎢ . ⎥ , B = ⎢ ⎥,then,
a .. ..
â = ⎢ . . ⎥ it The following series was obtained using the discrete data shown
u ⎣ .. ⎦ ⎣ (1) (1) ⎦ in Table 1: P(0) ={90.91, 80.14, 84.99, 82.64, 75.14, 57.74, 72.12,
(0) −(pn + pn−1 ) 1
pn 64.01};
2 The following series was obtained after successive accumula-
was converted to the following equation:
tion:
−1 T
P(1) ={90.91, 171.05, 256.04, 338.69, 413.83, 471.57, 543.69,
â = (BT B) B yn (2) 607.71};
256 F.-c. Jiang et al. / Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258

Table 1 sidered a predictive model, which can provide suggestions to guide

The value of casualties per thousand people over 8 years.
the safety investment in enterprises.
Time Casualty Number of Casualty rate per
series figures employees thousand people
4. Establishment of a model for safety investment and
1 72 792 90.91 accident control
2 67 836 80.14
3 77 906 84.99
4 70 847 82.64
To create a model of safety investment and accident control, a
5 81 1078 75.14 multiple regression fit analyses of each investment set and gray
6 66 1143 57.74 forecasting values of the casualty rates per thousand people were
7 89 1234 72.12 performed based on the safety investment data and casualty rates
8 74 1156 64.01
per thousand people in a coal mining enterprise over eight years.
Finally, a gray multivariate control model was established (Ciulla
Table 2 and Amico, 2019).
The casualties predicted per thousand people. Table 3 shows the analysis results of the safety investments
Time Casualty rate per Predicted of the coal mining enterprise over eight years, including human,
series thousand people casualty rate per machine, and environment subsets as well as intersection subsets.
thousand people

1 90.91 90.91 4.1. The prerequisites for establishing a multivariate control

2 80.14 84.56 model
3 84.99 80.61
4 82.64 76.84
5 75.14 73.24 When a multivariate linear regression model is to be established,
6 57.74 69.82 the presence of linear variation tendencies between dependent and
7 72.12 66.55 independent variables should be examined first via data visual-
8 64.01 63.44 ization (Zhuo, 2014). In other words, whether certain correlations
9 —— 60.47
10 —— 57.64
existed between investment sets and casualty rates per thousand
people shall be confirmed as a first step.
Using the data visualization function in Matlab, linear correla-
The following parameter vectors were developed: tions were noted between subsets and casualty rates per thousand
⎡ ⎡⎤ ⎤ people. This revealed that a multivariate linear regression model
80.14 −130.98 1 could be established. Figure 5 illustrates the data visualization
⎢ 84.99 ⎥ ⎢ −213.55 ⎥ details.
⎢ ⎥ ⎢ ⎥
1
⎢ 82.64 ⎥ ⎢ −254.87 ⎥ 1 Fig. 3 indicates the presence of a certain correlation between
⎢ ⎥
yn = ⎢ 75.14 ⎥B = ⎢
⎢ −376.26 ⎥
⎥ 1 safety investment sets and the accident index (predicted casualty
⎢ ⎥ ⎢
⎢ 57.74 ⎥ ⎢ −442.70 1 ⎥
⎥ rate per thousand people), which satisfies the prerequisite require-
⎢ ⎥ ⎣ −507.63 1 ⎦
⎣ 72.12 ⎦ ments for a multivariate accident control model.

61.04 −575.70 1
4.2. Establishing the multivariate accident control model
Matlab was used to solve the  following equation: â = The gray multivariate control model is expressed as follows:
−1 0.0479
(BT B) BT yn , and thus â = was obtained. The solution
90.9593 P(s) = ˇ1 s1 + ˇ2 s2 + ˇ3 s3 + ˇ4 s4 + ε (7)
for the final gray forecasting equation was obtained as follows:
where P is the predicted casualty rate per thousand people, ‰; ˇi
p̂k+1 = 1898.94 − 1808.03e−0.0479k
(1) is the regression coefficient; Si is the subset investment per ten
(5)
thousand yuan; and ␧ is the multivariate regression constant. To
Equation (6) was used for inverse accumulation and restora- produce control effects, ˇi should be a negative value.
tion. The obtained predicted casualty rates per thousand people ˇi and ε values were obtained using Matlab software based on
are listed in Table 2. the predicted casualty rates per thousand people (Table 2) and the
The results show that the casualty rates per thousand people safety investment sets (Table 3). Finally, a gray multivariate model
processed with gray forecast theory were more correlated and of safety investment and accident control for the coal mining enter-
predictable than the unprocessed data. The results and their corre- prise was developed as follows:
sponding forecasting values were used to create a model of safety
investment and accident control. Therefore, this model can be con- P (s) = −0.153s1 − 0.315s2 − 0.128s3 − 0.625s4 + 141.08 (8)

Table 3
Safety investment of a coal mining enterprise over 8 years.

Time series Human subset Machine subset Environment Intersection

S1 /ten thousand S2 /ten thousand subset S3 /ten subset S4 /ten
yuan yuan thousand yuan thousand yuan

1 14.82 74.21 106.59 19.50

2 29.52 107.10 68.46 18.02
3 17.78 131.9 58.48 15.96
4 31.58 108.24 75.13 18.02
5 27.58 113.6 72.16 29.30
6 51.04 100.78 76.44 34.94
7 30.28 106.27 107.9 34.54
8 60.28 119.75 90.87 32.80
 F.-c. Jiang et al. / Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258
Fig. 3. Subsets correlated with casualty rates.
Fig. 4. Safety investment and accident gray multivariate control curve.
Based on this model, a regression curve of investment sets and
casualty rates per thousand people was established (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4 shows that the casualty rate per thousand people in the
coal mining enterprise decreased with the increase in the overall
safety investment. The overall decline over eight years was roughly
28‰. According to the gray multivariate accident control model,
it could be predicted that the rate would drop to approximately
19.48‰ if the enterprise invested one million dollars in each subset
(five million yuan in total). In real production scenarios, enter-
prises can continuously adjust their safety investments based on
the aforementioned control model by using it to predict and the
mitigate accident rate and formulate tailor-made safety investment
257
schemes depending on their needs. This process must be conducted
under constraints of corporate benefits and other factors. Therefore,
it is crucial for enterprises to design reasonable safety investment
schemes.
5. Conclusions
(1) A safety investment index structure was redesigned from a
novel perspective based on a combination of principles behind
safety system engineering and set theory. The new safety
investment indices were categorized into four subsets: human,
machine, environment, and an intersection of them. Investment
elements in the subsets were analyzed to create a compre-
hensive safety investment index system, which serves as a
reference for safety investment decision making in coal mining
and other productive enterprises.
(2) A gray forecasting method was used to handle disordered data
in accident statistical indices, and hence highlighting the cor-
relations and regularities between casualty rate per thousand
people and safety investment.
(3) A multivariate regression approach was used to create a model
of safety investment and accident control for coal mining enter-
prises. As indicated by the established accident control model,
the studied coal mining enterprise must invest at least five
million yuan in safety to reduce the casualty rate per thou-
sand people to 20‰ or less. This proves that safety investment
can significantly influence accident control. Therefore, scien-
tific and reasonable safety investment strategies are required
to guarantee safe coal production.
(4) According to the multivariate accident control model, enter-
prises can effectively control accidents by continuously
increasing the safety investments. However, realistically, enter-
258 F.-c. Jiang et al. / Process Safety and Environmental Protection 136 (2020) 253–258
prises are unable to invest in safety without limitations. Thus,
the model should be optimized to ensure maximum accident
control and reasonable safety investments. Therefore, further
investigations are required to consider the financial and other
limitations into the proposed accident control model.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgement
The authors thank the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (51674127) for sponsoring this research.
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