Health & Safety Report 2016

HEALTH & SAFETY REPORT 2016

8. Publications A key function of Oil & Gas UK is to lead or support the development of industry guidelines and to promote sharing of good practice and information. Guidelines are typically developed by appropriate technical experts drawn frommember companies and supported by Oil & Gas UK staff. This section summarises recent health and safety related publications. 8.1 Cumulative Risk Guidelines Understanding cumulative risk and the interactions and interdependencies of systems and how they might impact the risk profile is an essential part of risk management offshore. If a piece of equipment, a procedure, or a person does not function as intended and there is the increased potential for adverse consequences, all practicable alternative or additional measures must be identified and implemented so that the risk remains as low as reasonably practicable (ALARP). However, while this is well-understood for a single adverse situation or deviation, the significance of the threat from the cumulative effect of a number of deviations has become more apparent in recent years. It is recognised that managing each deviation individually may not mitigate the overall risk of these acting together. The Cumulative Risk Guidelines, Issue 1 , due to be published during summer 2016, aims to increase awareness of the need to manage cumulative risk and provides guidance on developing a framework to do this. The framework covers assessment of cumulative risk and suggests a number of approaches and methods, recognising that different cumulative risk issues may require varying assessment methods.

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