Safety leadership in offshore renewables

The REZ brings with it opportunities both to learn from the oil and gas industry and to demonstrate leadership in health and safety in the development of emerging energy technologies, writes Duncan MacLean, a partner in the Marine Team at Brodies LLP.

An order extending the scope of UK onshore health and safety legislation to REZs, renewed by the Westminster Parliament for a further two years, keeps REZs under the same regime that is familiar for the oil and gas industry in areas designated for mineral exploration. The 2020 Vision – the Scottish Government’s increased target of generating 100% of Scotland’s electricity demand from renewable sources in Scottish Territorial Waters by 2020, presents a number of challenges to those charged with delivering it. One is the health and safety of all of those involved in the works at sea to install, operate and maintain the infrastructure and devices to generate the energy to fulfil the vision. The well established health and safety regime in the UK sector of the North Sea is widely regarded as one of the best in the world and has much to offer to the safe development of marine renewable projects.

A recent seminar hosted by Brodies, “Offshore Health and Safety – in from the Deep toward the 2020 Vision”, considered the changes that are taking place and the challenges they present. Oil and gas industry contractors are bringing their expertise to shallower waters, whilst those in the coastal and marine contracting industry are moving further out to sea. This interface presents new challenges as does the role of different regulators in these new areas of development; the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) with its responsibilities in the REZs, and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency with its responsibility for UK vessels and vessels operating in UK waters.

There was consensus among the audience, which ranged from renewable energy and oil and gas contractors to insurers, that the issue of safety was paramount and that a key feature of developments was that they had to be planned on a ‘cradle to grave’ basis and designed for inherent full life safety. Those taking the lead in the new developments had to think outside the box, not just in relation to the new devices and their installation but also in terms of the whole contractual chain and the interaction between designers, developers, major contractors and their smaller sub-contractors. Across the spectrum, from major utilities to significant ship owners, safety appears to be the top priority, so the commitment and key foundations are already in place

Developments in the offshore renewables industry will be delivered by many different contractors and a variety of vessel sizes not previously seen in the oil and gas industry. The challenges of using so many different vessels with crews with different expertise and seagoing experience are obvious. They can only be overcome by thorough planning and by drawing on lessons learnt from the full life Safety Case model for safety in the oil industry. This encourages duty holder responsibility rather than excessive regulation and is vital for ensuring the competency of and good communication within all tiers of the contractual chain.

Those driving the developments and those principally responsible for delivering them have both the opportunity and the responsibility to ensure that subcontractors further down the chain, who will all have vitally important roles to play in the overall delivery, are trained and equipped to deliver the services required in a safe and efficient manner.

Rightly, there is optimism about this new industry. As with any new venture, ownership and leadership are required at both industry and political levels so that the ‘intrinsic novelty’, to borrow the HSE’s apt phrase, of the industry, and the new environment into which the new technologies are being delivered, are fully understood and appropriate measures taken to ensure a safe and healthy outcome.