The audit was carried out from 27 March to 4 April 2019.

Background

The Draugen field is in the southern sector of the Norwegian Sea. The field has been developed using a concrete fixed facility with an integrated topside and has both platform and subsea wells. Draugen began production in 1993. The PSA has granted Draugen a lifetime extension to March 2024.

Norske Shell was the field’s operator until December 2018, when its shares and operatorship were transferred to Okea.

As part of its takeover of operation and maintenance of the facility, Okea has decided to change the maintenance management system.

In our audit of the transfer of activities from Shell to Okea, we observed that maintenance management was a topic that should be monitored through audits in 2019. Maintenance management is an important contributor to a sustainably high level of safety, and we consequently planned an audit to assess how Okea has managed the changes to maintenance management and how this management now functions on the facility.

Objective

The objective of the audit was to monitor that Okea’s management of maintenance, including its own follow-up and changes in progress that affect this management, meet the authorities’ and the company’s requirements.

We also wanted to check that efforts to improve maintenance management were ensuring that key contributors to HSE risk and major accidents were identified and followed up.

Result

The audit revealed that the company has faced challenges in establishing and/or transferring the processes and tools from the previous operator to its own systems and that the systems are still not fully operational.

The audit also detected some major omissions in the company’s systems and processes for managing maintenance. The new database tool for maintenance management (Star) was not fully implemented, despite the transition having been completed on 1 December 2018.

A series of governing documents and procedures had not been updated at the time of the audit. Access to the previous operator’s system (incl. SAP for maintenance) ended on 1 December 2018.

Through discussions and interviews, uncertainty was apparent in the organisation concerning objectives and management systems, as well as the basis for assessing systems and the technical integrity of equipment, and the significance this has for safety. In the light of the long operating history and other audits, the findings are surprising and serious.

The audit detected 10 non-conformities and 1 improvement point.

The non-conformities included:

  • Deficiencies in management systems and governing documents for maintenance management
  • Defective system for maintenance management
  • Defective maintenance programme for safety valves
  • Deficient barrier strategy and definition of performance requirements
  • Defective maintenance programme
  • Deficient labelling of equipment in the field
  • Deficient classification of systems and equipment
  • Inadequate documentation for the use of norms
  • Non-conformity handling
  • Deficient follow-up of the maintenance management system

The improvement point concerned the follow-up of the maintenance strategy.

Order

Based on the observations we made in the audit, we have issued Okea with the following order:

Pursuant to the Framework Regulations, Section 69 concerning administrative decisions, with reference to the Management Regulations, Section 6 on the management of health, safety and the environment, the Management Regulations, Section 21 concerning follow-up and the Activities Regulations Chap. IX concerning maintenance, we order you to implement the following measures:

1. Review the company’s maintenance management system and procedures with associated work processes and implement measures so that they function as intended, with reference to chapters 5.1.1 and 5.1.2 of the report.

A schedule for how this work is to be performed and monitored shall be submitted to the PSA by 12 July 2019.

The deadline for complying with item 1 of the order is set at 2 December 2019.

We shall be informed once the order has been complied with.

2. Meanwhile, you must ensure that safety-critical equipment and barriers at Draugen are maintained, with reference to chapters 5.1.4. and 5.1.7 of the report.