The Australian government says lessons will be learned by the Montara blow-out that took place late 2009.
In recognition of the global nature of the offshore petroleum industry, and Australia’s increasingly important role, the Canberra administration intends to host an international conference for governments, regulators and the offshore petroleum industry to share the lessons from Montara and to learn from the experience of other nations.
The conference will be held in Australia next year (2011). And, given the tragic Macondo blow-out in the US Gulf of Mexico in April this year and the Gullfaks C close shave a few weeks later, the timing of the event is apposite.
The Australian government has just published its draft response to the Montara blow-out inquiry and proposes accepting 92 of the 105 recommendations, noting 10, and not accepting three.
The three recommendations that are proposed not to be accepted relate to actions that the Canberra administration says are “technically inappropriate”.
It has committed to the setting up of a single national regulator for offshore petroleum activities by January 2012 to ensure Australia’s offshore industry is the “best and safest in the world”.
To create a single national regulator, the plan is to expand the functions of the existing National Offshore Petroleum Safety Authority (NOPSA) to include regulation of structural integrity, environment plans and day-to-day operations associated with petroleum activities offshore Australia.
The expanded authority – to be named the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA) – will also regulate safety, integrity and environment plans for minerals extraction and greenhouse gas storage activities in Commonwealth waters.
It was on Friday, August 21 last year, during activity being undertaken by the West Atlas jack-up drilling rig operated by Atlas Drilling, a hydrocarbon release was observed from the H1-ST1 well through the Montara wellhead platform in the early morning.
Eventually the decision was taken to drill a relief well, which started on September 14.
On November 1, 2009, a fire broke out on the West Atlas drilling rig and the Montara wellhead platform after the West Triton, which was drilling the relief well, successfully intercepted the leaking well on the fifth attempt.
On November 3, successful well-kill operations were undertaken, the fire was extinguished and the oil leak was contained.
On November 5, two days after the leak was stopped, the Australian minister for resources and energy established the Montara Commission of Inquiry and announced the appointment of Mr David Borthwick AO PSM as the commissioner.
His task … to investigate the likely causes of the incident and making recommendations to the Australian government on how to prevent future incidents.
Borthwick completed that task on June 18 this year with the handover of the Report of the Montara Commission of Inquiry.
In its draft response published last month, the government says it believes that in implementing its response to the report, and through actions already taken in advance of its release, the public “can have confidence in the ongoing operation and regulation of the offshore petroleum industry”.
A three-month, comprehensive stakeholder and community consultation is now under way with a view to fully inform Canberra’s final response to the Montara Inquiry.
The Montara Inquiry itself earlier concluded that the source of the blowout was largely uncontested and was a result of the primary well control barrier failing.
It noted that initial cementing problems were compounded by the fact that only one of the two secondary well control barriers – pressure containing anti-corrosion caps – was installed.
Chapter 4 of the report concluded that the existing regulatory regime supporting offshore petroleum activities provides sufficient powers to the regulator to enable the effective monitoring and enforcement of offshore petroleum-related operations.
The inadequacies identified by the inquiry primarily relate to the implementation of this regime.
Despite the deficiencies in the administration by the Northern Territories Department of Resources, the inquiry concluded that the incident could have been avoided by the operator PTTEP AA, if the company had adhered to the well control practices approved by the regulator and its own well construction standards.
The report recommended pursuing regulatory reform through the establishment of a single, independent regulatory body looking after safety as a primary objective, well integrity and environmental management.
The new performance/objective-based regulatory regime, which basically draws its goal-setting inspiration from Lord Cullen’s Piper Alpha report, is to be further enhanced by the establishment of a single national regulator for offshore petroleum, mineral and greenhouse gas storage activities.