Equinor – Snorre A – materials handling and work at height

• A notification of an order was sent 13 March 2024.

The audit was carried out from 23 to 26 January 2024.

Objective

The objective of the audit was to verify that Equinor’s management and follow-up of crane and lifting operations, including the drilling area, and work at height comply with the company’s and the authority’s requirements,  so as to reduce the likelihood of failures.

Result

We identified five non-conformities during the audit.  These concerned:

• Bunkering hose stations
• Assembly and disassembly of column hatches
• Maintenance of offshore cranes
• Maintenance of loading areas
• Overhead crane in storage container for lifting nipples

Follow-up of non-conformities

During the audit, we also verified how Equinor has addressed previously identified non-conformities and orders.  We found that the following non-conformities had not been addressed in line with the company’s feedback:

• Non-conformity concerning “Risky operation of bunkering hose stations” from Chapter 5.1.1 of the report following the audit of 16.10.2014.

Order

Pursuant to the Framework Regulations, section 69 concerning administrative decisions, with reference to the Management Regulations, section 22, concerning the handling of non-conformities, second para, first sentence and third paragraph, Equinor is ordered to:

• Identify measures to rectify the non-conformities concerning materials handling, lifting operations and maintenance at Snorre A, with reference to sections 5.1.1., 5.1.2, 5.1.3 and 5.1.4 of the report.
• Identify and implement necessary compensatory measures to maintain a prudent level in respect of health, safety and the environment until the non-conformities have been rectified.
• Prepare a binding and time-delimited plan for rectifying the non-conformities, with reference to bullet point 1 of the order.  The plan shall also describe the compensatory measures that have been implemented, with reference to bullet point 2 of the order.

What happens next?

The deadline for complying with the order is 12 June of this year.

We are to be notified when the order has been carried out.  In addition, by 14 June of this year, Equinor shall give Havtil a presentation of the plan for correcting the non-conformities, along with the compensatory measures implemented.