The Health, Safety, and Environmental Benefits of Real-Time Operations

Abstract

Traditionally, well-construction projects have required ongoing wellsite involvement of various personnel such as individuals representing the operator, contractor, and third party. The movement of people represents exposure to risk related to both travel and onsite operations. Conventional risk-mitigation methods currently include journey management, hazard analysis, and various other administrative controls. With the advent of real-time operations, a new opportunity to help reduce these risks has been introduced. Individuals who, in the past, were required to be on site can now access critical information, provide technical support, make decisions, and implement corrective actions while removed from the location. This improves manpower utilization and reduces cycle time, which can result in decreased exposure to all project personnel. Real-time operations enable all parties to gather and analyze data and take immediate corrective action without being onsite, significantly reducing the risk factors associated with a well-construction project. Introduction Over the past several years, the exploration and production industry has reported continuing improvements in lost time and recordable injury rates.1 One of the keys to this improvement is the use of risk identification and management tools. Operators, contractors, and regulators are working together as never before to identify, quantify, and mitigate known risk factors. As a result, industry has made tremendous progress in identifying and deploying tools focused on management systems, documented procedures, and workforce behavior. An associated risk-reduction change is also occurring in the form of technological advancements. Risk takes on various aspects when viewed across an entire well-construction project. The ability for all parties to cooperate and communicate known hazards is critical to maintaining an incident-free workplace. New tools, equipment, and services are being introduced that incorporate safety engineering and environmental concepts to reduce onsite hazards.2 In addition to reducing the hazards on site, another important mitigation tool involves minimizing the number of personnel who are at risk of being harmed. One advancement in technology that is particularly important to this type of risk reduction is the ability to deliver data from the wellsite to anywhere in the world instantaneously. This capability can lead to more informed and timely decisions while decreasing the need for certain experts to be on site. Not having to send experts to location can mitigate risks, save time, enhance productivity, and ultimately reduce the operating expense of the project. Depending on the scope, a typical drilling and completion operation can involve dozens of personnel over a period of months or years. Therefore, any means that can eliminate the need for onsite personnel can reduce exposure to the individuals. Displacement of unnecessary personnel from the project site and faster decision-making allow well-construction time to be cut, which in turn reduces exposure hours across all support functions. The resulting savings can then be redirected to additional risk analyis, well-construction services, performance recognition, and engineering programs. The Risk of Travel The International Association of Oil and Gas Producers (OGP) reports that the industry has shown substantial improvement in overall safety performance in the past 10 years, but the rate at which fatalities occur has shown little change.3,4 Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the OGP indicates that transportation, specifically vehicle-related incidents, is a leading cause of fatalities in upstream stages of exploration and production.3,4,5 When satellites and remote links are used, the only people who need to travel to location are those actually performing the tasks, such as operating the equipment or managing onsite operations. The use of remote technology allows technical experts to supervise the operation from their offices, a collaborative environment, or their homes (Fig. 1).6

Evolution of Real-Time Operations Monitoring: From Concept to Global Implementation

“…The value of using real-time data handling and visualization has been well-documented in literature [2][3][4][7][8][9] . Here, we provide some examples of products, services, and work processes that have added particular value (characterized using the abovementioned KPI's) to our operations:…”

Human-Factors Implications of Remote Drilling Operations: A Case Study From the North Sea

“…If part of the offshore team can be relocated onshore to support operations from an OOC, fewer people are required to work in higher-risk environments offshore, thereby reducing the potential harm to people (Knode and Disatell 2002). If part of the offshore team can be relocated onshore to support operations from an OOC, fewer people are required to work in higher-risk environments offshore, thereby reducing the potential harm to people (Knode and Disatell 2002).…”

Capability Development With Remote Drilling Operations

“…If part of the offshore team can be relocated onshore to support operations from an Onshore Operations Centre, fewer people are required to work in higher-risk environments offshore, thereby reducing the potential harm to people [1]. OOCs not only provide instant visual access to what is happening on the rig, they make it easier to call in additional onshore expertise to make better decisions faster [2,3].…”