Reforming Health, Safety, and Environmental Regulation for Offshore Operations in China: Risk and Resilience Approaches?

Organizational resilience in the oil and gas industry: A scoping review

Resilience derives from the study of socio-ecological systems and refers to the dynamical capacity to adapt to internal and external perturbations by changing its mode of operation without losing its ability to perform. The present article offers a scoping review of organizational research discussing the concept of resilience in the oil and gas industry. Rather than approaching a narrowly defined question as in systematic reviews, scoping reviews produce an overview of a body of knowledge covering broad questions. It reviews organizational research on resilience in the oil and gas industry by covering five main categories: conceptualizations; article type/methods; context/unit of analysis; relation between resilience and safety; and, central topics highlighted in the literature. The review of both empirical and conceptual literature reveals that the concept of resilience tends to be researched in terms of system capabilities or outcomes rather than processes. Integrated operations has provided new scenarios to discuss and investigate resilience in oil and gas production. However, findings demonstrate how resilience is often presented as a normative construct and there is little development in terms of understanding the dynamics of adaptive processes in the industry. The overall goal is to contribute to the study of organizational resilience by identifying areas for further study and by producing new knowledge that can permeate practices in organizations.

Proper Use of Technical Standards in Offshore Petroleum Industry

Ships for drilling need to operate in the territorial waters of many different countries which can have different technical standards and procedures. For example, the European Union and European Economic Area EU/EEA product safety directives exclude from their scope drilling ships and related equipment onboard. On the other hand, the EU/EEA offshore safety directive requires the application of all the best technical standards that are used worldwide in the oil and gas industry. Consequently, it is not easy to select the most appropriate technical standards that increase the overall level of safety and environmental protection whilst avoiding the costs of additional certifications. We will show how some technical standards and procedures, which are recognized worldwide by the petroleum industry, can be accepted by various standardization bodies, and how they can fulfil the essential health and safety requirements of certain directives. Emphasis will be placed on the prevention of fire and explosion, on the safe use of equipment under pressure, and on the protection of personnel who work with machinery. Additionally considered is how the proper use of adequate procedures available at the time would have prevented three large scale offshore petroleum accidents: the Macondo Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010; the Montara in the Timor Sea in 2009; the Piper Alpha in the North Sea in 1988.