The coming together of industry is so important, and it becomes even more pertinent as we approach the anniversary of a tragic event.
This year, we mark 35 years since Piper Alpha, and we continue to honour and keep in our thoughts those who died as a result of that awful tragedy, along with their families.
It is an important milestone in what is an ongoing journey – one in which we need to ensure every generation shares our determination that it will never happen again. There are many issues facing our sector, but fundamentally we must ensure that we keep people safe.
Alongside our net zero ambitions, a drive to delivering a harm-free UK Continental Shelf must be a core commitment from us all – people make this industry and our workforce both onshore and offshore must be kept safe from harm at work.
We need to ensure we do that by encouraging open communication, accountable leadership and a culture that allows for openness, sharing and respect.
Our latest reporting figures show a sustained trend of improving safety performance, for instance emissions from the production of oil and gas were down 20 per cent and offshore helicopter operations have remained accident-free, but we must never be complacent when it comes to safety.
When we break down barriers between onshore and offshore workers and when we break down barriers between organisations to share lessons, the more we recognise that openness, humility, and sharing are critical to eliminating risk.
We say that our people are core to success and we say that we are committed to eliminating harm, however we must demonstrate that through our actions.
Our skilled workforce is at the heart of our evolving industry. The oil and gas sector has the knowledge to ensure that the energy transition in wind, in hydrogen, and in carbon storage is both successful and safe. We must ensure we leverage that leadership and learning for our energy future.
It’s been four months already since we brought industry together to discuss these topics and more at our flagship HSE Conference where we explored the theme of ‘leading and learning’ – leadership, leading indications and learning as an industry.
We are now looking ahead to February 8 as the confirmed date for next year’s HSE Conference, which will be focused on the theme of ‘integrity’.
We know historically the UK oil and gas industry has looked at safety via lagging metrics and KPIs and we are now at a tipping point where that could really be revolutionised.
We hope to welcome around 500 people to our 2024 conference where we can examine what action has been taken and how we can be better prepared for all scenarios and eventualities when it comes to health, safety and environmental issues facing our sector.
One way this can be achieved is through greater utilisation of new technologies that are available and being developed.
Technologies like predictive analytics – so we can become more forward looking and prevent incidents from even happening in the first place. This move to measuring our performance by using leading indicators, not lagging, could be game-changing.
HSE is inextricably linked to a successful future as we transition to cleaner technologies –ensuring we have integrity in our approach to maintain the health and safety of our people and the environmental sustainability of our operations goes hand-in-hand with our commitment to deliver industry’s net zero goals.
As you all know too well, there is though no room for complacency in major hazard industries. We must continue to remain constantly vigilant whilst putting HSE at the very core of everything we do.
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