New Issues for Workers Safety in the Factory of the Future

Human in the factory is one of the main themes of the Factory of the Future; in this context the aim of this paper is to present the new issues for workers safety and integrated design concepts or methodologies which have to be taken into account. New paradigms come into being: the uncertainty of the demand in terms of products as well as production rate, product customization, product/service integration, variability in manufacturing processes and times, reconfiguration of manufacturing machine tools and systems, space organization, auto-organization and planning. Also, new technologies are implemented: robots, “plug and play” devices, virtual/augmented reality, sensors, OPC standards and connected objects. Several tasks are performed by the workers, the robots or both in collaboration. The workers are placed in the center of the Factory of the Future but this concept introduce hazardous events, problems of health and safety (physical or cognitive tasks, fatigue, stress, space and time organization, human-robot interfaces to take into account in the different working situations). So the aim of the paper is to present studies carrying out in order to propose to the machine or manufacturing systems designers as well as production managers structured methods, models and tools to get safe working situations in the frame of the Factory of the Future paradigm.