The Petroleum Safety Authority Norway (PSA) has issued an order to Equinor following an audit of electrical, process safety and safety and automation systems (SAS) on Martin Linge A. The audit was conducted from 17 to 24 June 2022
Notification of the order was made on 26 October 2022
The order was issued on 16 November 2022
The PSA has closely monitored Equinor's execution of the Martin Linge project. In this audit, our focus was on following up previously identified non-conformities and verifying the company's follow-up during the first year of production.
Observations
The audit identified two non-conformities and three improvement points.
The non-conformities concerned follow-up of the alarm system and handling of non-conformities.
The improvement points concerned start-up arrangements for emergency generators and fire pumps, training and drills and overpressure protection.
In addition, we found a non-conformity from an audit in 2021 that Equinor had not rectified in line with previous feedback to us. This concerned the defective design of the alarm system in the control room.
Order
We have identified serious breaches of the regulations and have issued Equinor with the following order:
Pursuant to the Framework Regulations, section 69 concerning administrative decisions, with reference to the Management Regulations, section 22, paras 2 and 3, concerning the handling of non-conformities, and the Facilities Regulations, section 34a concerning the control and monitoring system, we order Equinor Energy AS to:
- Identify and implement corrective measures to reduce the alarm rate for new and standing alarms so that they can be perceived and processed in the time required for the safe operation of equipment, facilities and processes, with reference to Chapter 5.1.1 of the report: Deficient follow-up of the alarm system. The measures shall be followed up and their effects evaluated.
- Undertake necessary compensatory measures to maintain a prudent level as regards health, safety and the environment until corrective measures have been implemented, with reference to point 1 of the order.
- The deadline for complying with Part 1 of the order is 1 April 2023. The deadline for complying with Part 2 of the order is 15 December 2022. We are to be notified when the order has been carried out.
