Oilfield Disaster Management

Abstract

Recently a significant number of accidents in offshore oil and gas industry have made us more concerned about enhancing the operational safety in offshore drilling and production worldwide. There is an urgent need of looking into the above problems by the operators, regulators and the stakeholders of the oil and gas industry. Compiling and analyzing the key factors, facilitating the sharing of the learning experiences, and interacting with the industry and the government can identify the areas where industry can continuously improve the operational safety and environment management. Since it is difficult for any regulator to inspect the quality of the safety management system in oil and gas industry, the safety culture has to be inculcated within the industry to ensure safe operations under protected environment in offshore installations. In most cases, human factors in the management of emergency response are more important to reduce the risk of accidents. Lack of positive safety culture by the individuals, poor qualities of inspecting, reporting and auditing, and sharing of actual data complicate the above issue. In this paper, a critical assessment has been carried out on the operational safety and environmental issues and their management systems in offshore oil industry in India and abroad. Based on a few case studies, possible recommendations have been made which may be helpful for the oil and gas industry.

Keywords: Offshore oil and gas industry, operational safety and environmental issues, emergency response