Safety body looks into barrier management on Equinor’s Gullfaks A

Norwegian offshore safety watchdog, the Petroleum Safety Authority (PSA), has found a number of non-conformities and improvement points during an audit of Equinor’s Gullfaks A platform offshore Norway.

The PSA said on Friday that the audit, done from April 24 to 27, reviewed Equinor’s management and follow-up of barriers in relation to the company’s and the authorities’ requirements on Gullfaks A.

According to the safety body, this entails knowing which barriers are established and which function they will fulfill as well as which performance requirements are necessary to make the individual barrier effective.

During the audit the PSA identified non-conformities in connection with the follow-up of barriers, corrosion and technical condition of vital and/or safety-critical systems, labeling of pipes and valves, damage to cables in drag chains, escape routes from rooms for high voltage installations, and follow-up of the established management system.

Also, improvement points were found regarding updating of governing documents, training and competence, insulating coating in service corridor, and follow-up of assessments linked to technical conditions in the drilling areas

Equinor was given a deadline of September 10 to report on how the non-conformities and improvement points would be addressed.

As for the field, the main Gullfaks field lies in block 34/10 in the northern part of the Norwegian North Sea.  It has been developed with three large concrete production platforms.

The Gullfaks A platform began production on December 22, 1986, with Gullfaks B following on February 29, 1988, and the C platform on November 4, 1989.