Oblivion: The Dwelling of CEO and Head of HSE at Engineering Moments of Truth?
Engineers are employed to design and construct the “weakest” or “cheapest”
structures and operations that will succeed in accomplishing our objectives. We add
risk by drilling and removing natural barriers to the flow of fluids under stresses
and replacing them simultaneously with our artificial physical and operational
barriers and controls with more risk and we add this risk in hope of reward and
within moral and ethical limits this is the definition of “good”.
“The Problem”
There is a big difference between mitigation and low incident “luck” and yet how
many operations are not adequately thought through, measured and weighed in
order to determine truly how the operational loads exist within resistance
envelopes? How often are the compounding estimations of geomechanics and
casing and operational barriers summed up as “within” an arbitrary margin of safety
that loses meaning after layers upon layers of guesses? More importantly how
oblivious or unconcerned is upper management in these isolated moments? The
due diligence and due process creates the precise moral and ethical limits we must
operate within. Without moral and ethical limits even a good thing is evil. Perhaps
any of us have been witness to designs that would have failed if the “worst case”
load had occurred and the consequences would have been unacceptable. Is relying
on “luck” evil? There is a big difference in design factors from low pressure “sweet”
oil wells in the mature areas of the Permian basin and HTHP dry sour gas wells near
fishing communities and prevailing winds and currents in environmentally sensitive
areas and yet design factors are often rigidly set and followed by engineers and not
always understood. If we design the Permian well like the HTHP well we go broke
and starve the “poor”, yet if we drill the HTHP dry sour gas well like the Permian
well the “poor” on the rig and surroundings suffer the consequences of putting
money before hazard mitigation, load definition, leak and load resistance assurance,
and uncertainty avoidance and they all die and lose their most valuable assets as the
rig burns down in a fiery grave they cannot get much “poorer” than that. There are
areas where we can pump on the formations all day long and get only a few barrels
of sweet oil. These are the extremes and most of our projects are wells that exist
between the two extremes yet most financial and safety risk managers are oblivious
as to where and when the hazard mitigation, life and financial, happens in the
process and that many, if not most, engineers put into this position may be
improperly prepared nor supported with executive wisdom to deal with the stresses
of that moment and the spot they are often isolated in. It certainly is not safe to be
unaware of the safety critical moments in the design that all the safety mantra feign
knowledge of. Clearly there are non critical areas that the highest levels of diligence
and scrutiny are wasteful in yet wisdom and righteousness in that assessment
process is key and assuming that these engineers are prepared, supported nor that
any of the people pronouncing such great safety measures are involved are even
remotely aware of the moment in time and the spot these engineers are in during
this safety critical moment in the engineering design phase is a problem.
“The Solution”
My assertion on these topics is that we as engineers owe the public and our
coworkers due diligence in coming to our conclusions and designing our limits and
due process and transparency in broadcasting the levels of hazard and uncertainty
and the health of our barriers and mitigations in relation to them. Yet the exact
opposite is not just commonly done yet in “cut n paste” designs and the secrecy and
whitewashing of hazards and uncertainty in supporting these projects to ensure the
corporate freedom to pursue these projects unrestrained they are policy, and more
often than not ignorant to the precursors of consequence that these early
engineering designs constitute. This discussion is important not as criticism and yet
as validation in asking the right questions that refuse to ignore that “the emperor
has no clothes” in some instances with a wink and handshake treatment of hazards
and uncertainty assessments and subsequent operational loads and design factors
decisions. The CEOs need to know that their safety programs are firmly in the hands
of engineers at these moments and not the HSE people, and the front line workers
that get left “holding the bag” all too often. An over done casing design is like a gold
ring in a pig’s snout yet an underdone one is like a fireman with a squirt gun. A CEO
that doesn’t know the safety critical moments in well design is like letting a toddler
land a jumbo jet.