Investigating the effect of the PSA’s supervision

Our most important job as a regulator is to assess whether the companies are running their operations prudently and in line with the regulations,” says Ingvill Hagesæther Foss, one of the PSA’s directors of supervision.

“At the same time, it’s part of our mandate to help reach the goal of an industry which leads the world for health, safety and the environment [HSE]. We want our supervisory activities to have a positive effect on the level of HSE.

“We conduct many follow-up activities during a year, and these differ. Audits occupy a key place, but we also pursue meeting series and activities directed at the industry as a whole. We work to learn more about which activities are the most effective, and how we can make best use of our resources.”

What has effect?

Meetings with a variety of petroleum industry participants have provided valuable information, both in terms of the companies’ immediate perception of our audits and how they respond to our observations and findings. We have identified certain key concepts emerging from these meetings and will be holding new meetings every six months or so.

Further reading: Meetings to investigate the effects of the PSA’s supervision 

We also conduct a large user survey of our supervisory activity. Even the pilot version of this, in 2018, gave us useful input into how our audits are perceived by the industry, the effect they have and potential improvement points for the future.

This study found that the companies by and large believe the PSA conducts its audits in a good and professional manner. At the same time, areas with a potential for improvement were identified. In 2019, we expanded to a full-scale survey, in which we asked about experiences of all audits conducted during the year.

Useful experience and knowledge can also be acquired from other government agencies, such as the Norwegian Board of Health and the National Institute for Occupational Health (Stami).

The Board of Health completed a four-year research project in 2018 which studied the effect of supervision in the health service (in Norwegian only).

For its part, Stami has just launched a research project in cooperation with the Norwegian Labour Inspection Authority on the effects of the latter’s enforcement powers (in Norwegian only).

New study

The Menon consultancy has now been tasked with evaluating the effect of our follow-up activities directed at individual companies and at industry level within two key areas: well control and chemical health risk. Over time, both these topics have been addressed by us in many different ways.

In this project, by “effect” we mean changes in knowledge, motivation, procedures, instruments or practices, in individual companies or more widely in the industry, as a result of the measures/activities we undertake. Our assumption is that there is a relationship between such changes and a change in the HSE level, and hence an indirect relationship between the effect of the PSA’s activities and the HSE level. However, this relationship is a complex one.

Our aim for the project is to answer the following questions:

• In the companies’ opinion, what effect have the activities under the auspices of the PSA had on their own efforts within these topics? What has been done as a result of these activities?
• What other factors (e.g. impacts of incidents, contact with other companies, industry organisations not involving the PSA) have brought about changes? Might the PSA’s activities have had an indirect impact on these?
• What has been the contribution of the PSA’s efforts as a whole?
• Which other activities under the auspices of the PSA could have instigated other or better measures in the companies?

Enhancing quality

“Our follow-up is intended to be a supplement to the work done by the companies themselves, and it’s naturally important for us that our priorities and use of resources have the best possible effect,” comments Hagesæther Foss.

“The goal is not only to enhance the quality of our own supervision but also to ensure that the companies become more conscious that their own follow-up activities are the right ones.”

She also emphasises that the follow-up conducted by the companies themselves represents a key part of their responsibility.

All players are therefore urged to think through how their own activities can be planned and followed up in such a way that the greatest possible effect is achieved.

Follow-up

“Audits and follow-up activities are very resource-intensive, whether we carry them out or they are done internally in the company,” Hagesæther Foss observes.

“We want to get as much as possible out of the activities. To achieve that, it’s not least important to check that the measures or follow-up actions are actually implemented and work as intended. In our experience, sticking with a subject over time is also important.”

In addition, the PSA sees that differences exist between the way companies get to grips with nonconformities and the improvement points it identifies. Measures taken in the companies are crucial in determining whether a supervisory activity has a positive effect on the level of HSE.