The knowledge gained from the project is intended to contribute to risk reduction through the development and continuous improvement of automated systems in the petroleum industry.

The report is a continuation of a preliminary study carried out by SINTEF in 2021, which dealt with the reporting of incidents in automated systems in drilling operations. The feasibility study revealed that incidents and near-misses are not adequately captured, and that drillers are already highly burdened with their responsibilities/tasks and hence should not be subject to additional reporting requirements. One of the recommendations from the preliminary study was therefore to look at opportunities for further facilitating the automated reporting and standardisation of the processing of incident data.

On this basis, SINTEF has assessed and described opportunities and prerequisites, including methods and technical solutions, involved in the automated reporting of faults and incidents. The report assesses relevant initiatives and technologies for the collection, processing and sharing of incident data from other sectors and industries. Further light is also shed by means of two case studies: one of automated drilling systems and one of critical topside safety systems.

Based on the report’s findings, 12 recommendations have been made to the industry and three to the PSA, as well as some proposals for further knowledge acquisition. The recommendations to the industry largely concern standardisation, data quality and the need for instrumentation, and data ownership. The recommendations to the PSA pertain to the reporting threshold, the RNNP criteria and documentation of independence.

The need for further knowledge acquisition relates to the possibility of fault scenario simulations to form a virtual data basis, the possibility of joint experiential databases for safety-critical equipment, as well as assessment of the potential benefits of reporting at a lower level than today, for example from the reporting of near-misses and less serious incidents as well.