I IIASA PROCEEDINGS SERIES Volume 16 Managing Technological Accidents: Two Blowouts in the North Sea IIASA PROCEEDINGS SERIES CARBON DIOXIDE, CLIMATE AND SOCIETY 11 DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEMS: ISSUES AND Proceedings of an lIASA Workshop Cosponsored CHALLENGES by WMO, UNEP, and SCOPE, Proceedings of an International Task Force February 21-24, 1978 Meeting, Jill Williams, Editor June 23-25, 1980 Garan Fick and Ralph H. Sprague, Jr., Editors 2 SARUM AND MRI: DESCRIPTION AND COMPARISON OF A WORLD MODEL AND A 12 MODELING OF LARGE-SCALE ENERGY NATIONAL MODEL SYSTEMS Proceedings of the Fourth nASA Symposium on Proceedings of the nASA/IFAC Symposium on Global Modeling, Modeling of Large-Scale Energy SYstems, September 20-23, 1976 February 25-29, 1980 Gerhart Bruckmann, Editor W. Hafele, Editor, and L.K. Kirch mayer, Associate Editor 3 NONSMOOTH OPTIMIZATION Proceedings of an nASA Workshop, 13 LOGISTICS AND BENEFITS OF USING MATH­ March 28-April8, 1977 EMATICAL MODELS OF HYDROLOGIC AND Gaude Lemarechal and Robert Mifflin, Editors WATER RESOURCE SYSTEMS Selected Papers from an International Symposium, 4 PEST MANAGEMENT October 24-26, 1978 Proceedings of an International Conference, A.J. Askew, F. Greco, and J. Kindler, Editors October 25-29,1976 G.A. Norton and C.S. Holling, Editors 14 PLANNING FOR RARE EVENTS: NUCLEAR ACCIDENT PREPAREDNESS AND MANAGE­ 5 METHODS AND MODELS FOR ASSESSING MENT ENERGY RESOURCES Proceedings of an International Workshop, First lIASA Conference on Energy Resources, January 28-31, 1980 May 20-21, 1975 John W. Lathrop, Editor MkhelGrenon,Edftor 15 SCALE IN PRODUCTION SYSTEMS 6 FUTURE COAL SUPPLY FOR THE WORLD Based on an nASA Workshop, ENERGY BALANCE June 26-29, 1979 Third IIASA Conference on Energy Resources, John A. Buzacott, Mark F. Cantley, Vladimir N. November 28-December 2,1977 Glagolev, and Rolfe C. Tomlinson, Editors Michel Grenon, Editor 16 MANAGING TECHNOLOGICAL ACCIDENTS: 7 THE SHINKANSEN HIGH·SPEED RAIL NET· TWO BLOWOUTS IN THE NORTH SEA WORK OF JAPAN Incorporating the Proceedings of an llASA Work- Proceedings of an nASA Conference, shop on Blowout Management, April 1978 June 27-30, 1977 David W. Fischer, Editor A. Straszak and R. Tuch, Editors 8 REAL·TIME FORECASTING/CONTROL OF WATER RESOURCE SYSTEMS Selected Papers from an lIASA Workshop, October 18-20,1976 Eric F. Wood, Editor, with the Assistance of Andras Szo1l6si·Nagy 9 INPUT-OUTPUT APPROACHES IN GLOBAL MODELING Proceedings of the Fifth lIASA Symposium on Global Modeling, September 26-29, 1977 Gerhart Bruckmann, Editor 10 CLIMATIC CONSTRAINTS AND HUMAN ACTIVITIES Selected Papers from an nASA Task Force Meeting, February 4-6,1980 Jesse Ausubel and Asit K. Biswas, Editors MANAGING TECHNOLOGICAL ACCIDENTS: TWO BLOWOUTS IN THE NORTH SEA Incorporating the Proceedings of an IIASA Workshop on Blowout Management, April 1978 DAVID W. FISCHER Professor of Political Science and Director of Coastal Zone Studies at the University of West Florida and Research Professor at the Institute of Industrial Economics, Bergen Editor PERGAMON PRESS OXFORD' NEW YORK . TORONTO' SYDNEY . PARIS' FRANKFURT U.K. Pergamon Press Ltd., Headington Hill Hall, Oxford OX3 OBW, England U.S.A. Pergamon Press Inc., Maxwell House, Fairview Park, Elmsford, New York 10523, U.S.A. CANADA Pergamon Press Canada Ltd., Suite 104, 150 Consumers Rd., Willowdale, Ontario M2J IP9, Canada AUSTRALIA Pergamon Press (Aust.) Pty. Ltd., P.O. Box 544, POlis Point, N.S.W. 2011, Australia FRANCE Pergamon Press SARL, 24 rue des Ecoles, 75240 Paris, Cedex OS, France FEDERAL REPUBLIC Pergamon Press GmbH, 6242 Kronberg-Taunus, OF GERMANY Hammerweg 6, Federal Republic of Germany Copyright © 1982 International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis All RighiS Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced. stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape. mechanical. photocopying, recording or otherwise. without permission in writing from the copyright holders. First edition 1982 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Managing technological accidents. - (IIASA proceedings series; V.16) I. Oil wells - Blowouts - North Sea 2. Oil fields - Safety measures - North Sea I. Fischer, David W. II. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis Ill. Series 622'.3382'0289 TN871.2 ISBN 0-08-029346-8 Library of Congress Catalog Card no: 82-7479 Printed in Great Britain by A. Wheaton & Co. Ltd.• Exeter v For Lynne, Lucy, and Jeff vii CONTENTS Preface ............................................... xi Introduction . D(lJlid W. Fischer PART ONE: REVIEW OF THE BLOWOUT PROBLEM An overview of the North Sea blowout problem .................... 9 David W. Fischer 2 The oil and gas blowout at Bravo Platform, Ekofisk Field, Norwegian Sector .. , 31 D(lJlid W. Fischer 3 The gas blowout at Maersk Explorer Platform, Danish Sector. ......... .. 63 D(lJlid W. Fischer 4 Organizational issues at Bravo and Three Mile Island: a comparison. ..... .. 75 David W. Fischer 5 Summary ofissues arising from the Blowout Workshop 93 David W. Fischer PART TWO: PAPERS FROM THE BLOWOUT WORKSHOP 6 A national perspective on the oil-blowout problem " 109 Hans-Christian Bugge 7 Prevention, regulation, and risk ............................. .. 115 7.1 Safety aspects of oil blowouts. ....................... .. 115 Bj~rn Vedeler 7.2 Management and control of oil blowouts in the North Sea: risk analysis for prevention ............................ .. 118 Svein Fjeld and BNm Myklatun viii 7.3 Blowout risk - ghost or reality? ...................... .. 128 Svein Fjeld 7.4 Offshore industry needs safe operators in safety-conscious organizations. .................................. .. 133 CarstenB¢e 7.5 A regulatory approach to blowout prevention. ............ .. 136 Dag Meier-Hansen 7.6 Legislation for offshore facilities in the marine environment. ... " 138 H.R. George and A.D. Read 7.7 An operator approach to blowout prevention. ............ .. 148 Kai Killerud 7.8 Measuring social risk and determining its acceptability. ....... .. 152 John Lathrop 8 Well control. ......................................... .. 175 8.1 The Danish response to well control. , 175 Peter Steen 8.2 Norwegian regulatory responses to well control ............ .. 176 Dag Meier-Hansen 8.3 UK regulatory responses to well and pollution control. ....... .. 177 A.D. Read 8.4 An operator approach to control. ..................... .. 179 Kai Killerud 9 Pollution control. ...................................... .. 185 9.1 Oil-spill cleanup arrangements in the offshore oilfie1ds " 185 A.D. Read 9.2 The regulatory approach to pollution control ............. .. 191 A.J. Flikke 9.3 Environmental effects from the operator's viewpoint , 196 Eric B. Cowell 9.4 Oil exploitation - a danger to fisheries? ................. .. 198 Lars F¢yn 9.5 Effects of pollution control on marine ecosystems and species ... , 201 R.J. Monis 9.6 Alternative postures for oil-slick cleanup. ................ .. 204 David W. Fischer 9.7 The ecological effects of using dispersants: experience in the United Kingdom ................................ .. 205 Eric B. Cowell ix 10 Overviews............................................. 217 10.1 North Sea oil hazards: the environment/development interface and implications for management , 217 A.J. Fairclough 10.2 Round-table discussions - a summary , 229 David W. Fischer Author index. ........................................ .. 232 Subject index. ........................................ .. 233 MTA _ A" xi PREFACE For some time before April 1977 1 had been studying environmental and develop­ ment issues in the North Sea. During this research I was told by both industry and govern­ ment agencies that blowouts of oil and gas wells in the area were "impossible today". Thus, when the serious blowout occurred at the Bravo Platform, Ekofisk Field, in the Norwegian sector on April 22, 1977, it was clearly an event of vital significance, not only for those directly involved, but also for the work on which I was engaged. Since the contacts and cooperation generated in my earlier work offered me a unique opportunity to follow this event and its consequences within the Norwegian Government and the North Sea oil industry, I did so. Those directly involved extended the cooperation required and I was able to interview key persons in the Norwegian Action Command that had been directly involved in responding to the Bravo blowout. Less than six months later, on October 14, 1977, a second blowout occurred, this time at the Maersk Explorer Platform off the coast of Denmark. Again, the necessary co­ operation was extended and I was able to interview the officials responsible in Denmark. Under the aegis of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), a workshop on blowout management was organized, using these two incidents as the point of departure for the discussion. Widespread interest was shown, and representatives of both industry and government from the United Kingdom and Norway, as well as from other North Sea countries, Canada, and the United States, attended the meeting. The workshop was supported financially by IIASA and technically by the Norwegian Petro­ leum Society, this latter body being interested in promoting and disseminating practical information and research results to its membership. This volume started out as an account of the proceedings of the workshop. How­ ever, in addition (in Part One), I have myself contributed five chapters. Four of these give an overview of the North Sea