MASAR Management Assurance of Safety Adequacy, and Reliability
Authors: Purser Paul E. 
Published: October 2008

Offshore industry faces new environments in technology and in public relations. The equipment is unique and complex; the operating environments of winds, waves, etc., are uncertain and the operations are remote. There is great public concern over oil spills and other forms of pollution. This has resulted in increased chances for "bad" public relations and public civil legal action and also in increased governmental regulation. Thus, industry faces a potential for added costs beyond the usual repair and loss-of-production costs from accidents and needs new means of coping with the technological and public relations environments. Greater assurance of safety and reliability can be gained by adapting some of the management techniques developed in the U.S. aerospace program. The present paper discusses some of these methods and explores their application to offshore activities. Emphasis is placed on design reviews, failure mode and effect analyses single failure point summaries, hazard analyses, and operational readiness inspections.

INTRODUCTION

In offshore development and operations, industry faces new and strange environments in technology and in public relations. The equipment being used or developed is characterized by uniqueness, complexity, small numbers of duplicate or similar items, new and innovative designs, uncertainties about the operating environments of winds, waves, foundation stability, etc., and remoteness of operations. The area is also characterized by a public atmosphere of great interest and great concern over the potential ecological hazards created by oil spills and other forms of pollution. This, in turn, has resulted in increased possibilities of "bad" public relations and public civil legal action against industries who suffer accidents. There are also increased numbers of, and attention to enforcement of, governmental laws and regulations. The governmental activity seems to be tending more and more strongly toward the "potentiality theory" discussed by Loevinger, l wherein the potential for an occurrence is almost as bad as the occurrence itself. All of this places on industry a potential for added economic burdens beyond the usual repair and loss-of-production financial costs associated with accidents.

Management's historical concern with economy - both in terms of the individual company's financial gain and in terms of the national needs for energy and mineral resources must now include new levels of consideration for the effects of the technological and public-relations environments noted above. In view of this situation, management needs a new degree of assurance that this new and unusual equipment will operate safely and reliably in order to satisfy the needs of both economy and ecology.2 It is believed that improved management assurance of safety and reliability can be gained by adapting (not adopting) some of the technical management techniques that have been developed in the U. S. space program.

In facing a similar combination of complexity and concern in the space program, government and industry jointly developed many structured management techniques. Two of the earliest of these techniques are the now familiar "systems concept" and "PERT-CPM". Other efforts are evident in such papers as Hawkes5 on "reliability engineering" and McCarron4 on "computer simulation" at the 1971 Offshore Technology Conference.