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The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) has issued its final report on the Deepwater Horizon horror story which the press has seemingly gone way out its way to ignore. The report is 136 pages of well-documented, cold, clinical, pure damnation and no one involved goes blameless. Prospects for the future don't look much brighter. You have to enter a name and valid email addy but you can download PDF's of the summary and the full report here.
The NAE is basically the crème de la crème of the who's who in the engineering profession. One has to have had a stellar, life-long career of contributing to the profession to even be considered for membership. The NAE has an abundance of internal expertise but went outside their organization for additional specialized expertise for this report.
Of all the reports on the Deepwater Horizon/Macondo horror story this is the report I trust the most. The NAE has an excellent record of top-drawer analysis untainted by the grinding of political axes. NAE readily admits what they don't know and documents what they do know.
The NAE is hyperbole averse which makes the matter-of-fact analysis the report provides even more horrifying. Reading the myriad of ways that this tragedy could have likely been prevented is both infuriating and heartbreaking. Even worse is that so precious little has been done that would prevent the next deadly deepwater blowout.
The Department of Interior requested the study but, cynically, did not request that the NAE study provide an in-depth analysis of containment systems should all prevention fail. My guess is that even the sober-minded NAE would have a tough time keeping a straight face when analyzing those pitiful capabilities. At present, there is absolutely nothing that will stop the flow of blown out well if there are high seas and a damaged geological formation that can not withstand the pressure of the well being shut in.
The NAE findings as to the cause for the Macondo blowout and the loss of the Deepwater Horizon could pretty much serve as a how-to manual for how to cause a deep water blowout and lose the drilling platform in the process. All of the companies involved missed multiple opportunities to take actions that would have prevented the catastrophe. The problem of greed pummeling safety to a pulp is industry-wide in deepwater drilling.
Summary Findings
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2. The decision to proceed to displacement of the drilling mud by sea water was made despite a failure to demonstrate the integrity of the cement job even after multiple negative pressure tests. This was but one of a series of questionable decisions in the days preceding the blowout that had the effect of reducing the margins of safety and that evidenced a lack of safety-driven decision making. (Finding 2.2)
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3. The reservoir formation, encompassing multiple zones of varying pore pressure and fracture gradients, posed significant challenges to isolation using casing and cement. The approach chosen for well completion failed to provide adequate margins of safety and led to multiple potential failure mechanisms. (Finding 2.3)
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5. The BOP system was neither designed nor tested for the dynamic conditions that most likely existed at the time that attempts were made to recapture well control. Furthermore, the design, test, operation, and maintenance of the BOP system were not consistent with a high-reliability, fail-safe device. (Finding 3.16)
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7. The actions, policies, and procedures of the corporations involved did not provide an effective systems safety approach commensurate with the risks of the Macondo well. The lack of a strong safety culture resulting from a deficient overall systems approach to safety is evident in the multiple flawed decisions that led to the blowout. Industrial management involved with the Macondo well- Deepwater Horizon disaster failed to appreciate or plan for the safety challenges presented by the Macondo well. (Finding 5.1)
The NAE report also points out that training as well as safety research and development are woefully inadequate given the complexity of deepwater drilling. Many experts have likened it to working in space with some aspects being even more challenging. We have seen none of the concerns expressed in the committee's observations being addressed.
Committee Observations
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2. The ability of the oil and gas industry to perform and maintain an integrated assessment of the margins of safety for a complex well like Macondo is impacted by the complex structure of the offshore oil and gas industry and the divisions of technical expertise among the many contractors engaged in the drilling effort. (Observation 5.1)
3. The regulatory regime was ineffective in addressing the risks of the Macondo well. The actions of the regulators did not display an awareness of the risks or the very narrow margins of safety. (Observation 6.1)
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5. Overall, neither the companies involved nor the regulatory community has made effective use of real-time data analysis, information on precursor incidents or near misses, or lessons learned in the Gulf of Mexico and worldwide to adjust practices and standards appropriately. (Observations 5.7 and 6.3)
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We still await standards and independent inspection for the barriers needed to keep deepwater drilling safe. Blowout preventers (BOPs) have not undergone the serious redesign changes nor is there anything even close to adequate testing to ensure their reliability.
Summary Recommendations
On the basis of its investigation of the Macondo well–Deepwater Horizon disaster and discussions with industry operating in the United States and the North Sea and with regulators from the United States, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Norway, the committee has developed a series of recommendations that it believes would materially improve the safety of future operations in the Gulf of Mexico.
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2. All primary cemented barriers to flow should be tested to verify quality, quantity, and location of cement. The integrity of primary mechanical barriers (such as the float equipment, liner tops, and well head seals) should be verified by using the best available test procedures. All tests should have established procedures and predefined criteria for acceptable performance and should be subject to independent, near-real-time review by a competent authority. (Recommendation 2.3)
3. BOP systems should be redesigned to provide robust and reliable cutting, sealing, and separation capabilities for the drilling environment to which they are being applied and under all foreseeable operating conditions of the rig on which they are installed. Test and maintenance procedures should be established to ensure operability and reliability appropriate to their environment of application. Furthermore, advances in BOP technology should be evaluated from the perspective of overall system safety. Operator training for emergency BOP operation should be improved to the point that the full capabilities of a more reliable BOP can be competently and correctly employed when needed in the future. (Recommendation 3.1)
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Industry, Regulators Should Take 'System Safety' Approach to Offshore Drilling in Aftermath of Deepwater Horizon Accident, Says New Report | National-Academies.org | Newsroom
Date: Dec. 14, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WASHINGTON — To reduce the risk of another accident as catastrophic as the Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill, a new report from the National Academy of Engineering and National Research Council says, companies involved in offshore drilling should take a "system safety" approach to anticipating and managing possible dangers at every level of operation -- from ensuring the integrity of wells to designing blowout preventers that function "under all foreseeable conditions." In addition, an enhanced regulatory approach should combine strong industry safety goals with mandatory oversight at critical points during drilling operations.
The report says the lack of effective safety management among the companies involved in the Macondo Well-Deepwater Horizon disaster is evident in the multiple flawed decisions that led to the blowout and explosion, which killed 11 workers and produced the biggest accidental oil spill in U.S. history. Regulators also failed to exercise effective oversight.
"The need to maintain domestic sources of oil is great, but so is the need to protect the lives of those who work in the offshore drilling industry as well as protect the viability of the Gulf of Mexico region," said Donald C. Winter, former secretary of the Navy, professor of engineering practice at the University of Michigan, and chair of the committee that wrote the report. "Industry and regulators need to include a factual assessment of all the risks in deepwater drilling operations in their decisions and make the overall safety of the many complex systems involved a top priority."
Despite challenging geological conditions, alternative techniques and processes were available that could have been used to prepare the exploratory Macondo well safely for "temporary abandonment" -- sealing it until the necessary infrastructure could be installed to support hydrocarbon production, the report says. In addition, several signs of an impending blowout were missed by management and crew, resulting in a failure to take action in a timely manner. And despite numerous past warnings of potential failures of blowout preventer (BOP) systems, both industry and regulators had a "misplaced trust" in the ability of these systems to act as fail-safe mechanisms in the event of a well blowout.
BOP systems commonly in use -- including the system used by the Deepwater Horizon -- are neither designed nor tested to operate in the dynamic conditions that occurred during the accident. BOP systems should be redesigned, rigorously tested, and maintained to operate reliably, the report says. Proper training in the use of these systems in the event of an emergency is also essential. And while BOP systems are being improved, industry should ensure timely access to demonstrated capping and containment systems that can be rapidly deployed during a future blowout.
Operating companies should have ultimate responsibility and accountability for well integrity, the report says, because only they possess the ability to view all aspects of well design and operation. The drilling contractor should be held responsible and accountable for the operation and safety of the offshore equipment. Both industry and regulators should significantly expand the formal education and training of personnel engaged in offshore drilling to ensure that they can properly implement system safety. Guidelines should be established so that well designs incorporate protection against the various credible risks associated with the drilling and abandonment process. In addition, cemented and mechanical barriers designed to contain the flow of hydrocarbons in wells should be tested to make sure they are effective, and those tests should be subject to independent, near real-time review by a competent authority.
The U.S. Department of the Interior's recent establishment of a Safety and Environmental Management Systems (SEMS) program -- which requires companies to demonstrate procedures for meeting explicit goals related to health, safety, and environmental protection -- is a "good first step" toward an enhanced regulatory approach. Regulators should identify and enforce safety-critical points that warrant explicit regulatory review and approval before operations can proceed.
Offshore drilling operations are currently governed by a number of agencies, sometimes with overlapping authorities. The U.S. should make a single government agency responsible for integrating system safety for all offshore drilling activities. Reporting of safety-related incidents should be improved to enable anonymous input, and corporations should investigate all such reports and disseminate lessons learned to personnel and the industry as a whole.
The study was sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Interior. The National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council make up the National Academies. They are private, nonprofit institutions that provide science, technology, and health policy advice under a congressional charter. The Research Council is the principal operating agency of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. For more information, visit http://national-academies.org.
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