Health & Safety Report 2015

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HEALTH & SAFETY REPORT 2015
page 38
7.3 Health and Safety Executive’s Offshore Intervention Strategy
During 2014, HSE’s Energy Division (ED) consolidated its major hazard inspection programme to ensure that its
resources are deployed to best effect. With support from Oil & Gas UK members, HSE developed a criteria for
ranking installations as A, B or C in a hierarchy based on inherent hazards; duty holder performance across a range
of factors; and other intelligence, such as previous incidents, the number of RIDDOR reports including HCR and the
effectiveness of major hazard barriers.
This, in turn, drives inspection frequency and ensures regulatory activity is proportionate to installation major
accident risk, taking into account the duty holder’s performance in controlling these risks. This means that ED will
inspect higher hazard installations and operators with poorer performance more frequently and in greater depth
than installation duty holders where risks are perceived to be better managed.
For 2014/15, about 50 category A installations were to be inspected twice, about 90 category B installations were
to be inspected once and circa 170 category C installations were not to be inspected. Inspectors assess how well
risks are controlled, the adequacy of emergency measures and make an objective judgement of the duty holder’s
compliance with offshore legislation. ED has also developed a number of inspection guides in consultation with
industry 15; these guides set out criteria against which operator’s performance is judged.
15 The HSE’s inspection guides are available at