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Saipem (SAPMF) Faces NOPSEMA Warning Over Safety Violations
Saipem (SAPMF) Faces NOPSEMA Warning Over Safety Violations
About this update from Saipem S.p.a.
Saipem SAPMF, an Italian oilfield services company, received a warning from the Australian regulatory body National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA), owing to safety breaches that could materially impact the health of workers onboard. The safety breaches were reported during welding operations on the pipelay vessel Castorone, which has been deployed at the site of Scarborough gas project, being developed by Woodside Energy.According to an unknown NOPSEMA official, Saipem Australia had violated a listed occupational health and safety law. The fumes released during welding operations contain hazardous chemicals and ultraviolet radiations that may cause significant and irreversible damage to the workforce.The first line of defense from the welding fumes and gases should have been engineering controls. However, instead of implementing engineering controls, Saipem had been relying on lower-order controls, such as the use of personal protective equipment, to protect its workforce against health hazards, the NOPSEMA official stated.The company’s industrial hygiene documentation clearly states that local exhaust ventilation controls should capture the contaminants at the source. However, the existing extraction system plugged at the welding stations above the firing line is not efficient in containing welding fumes. In fact, the prefabrication welding lines lack an extraction system entirely.In conclusion, Saipem’s engineering control measures at its welding stations are not aligned with the safety protocols, causing potential safety hazards for the workforce.In response to the allegations, Saipem has stated that it will comply with the regulations. The company has been told to monitor the level of air contaminants in the welding stations as well as in other areas where welding fumes are produced. It must also deploy local exhaust ventilation engineering controls, which ensure the extraction of welding fumes at the source of generation. Alternatively, other control measures are to be implemented to bring down exposure levels to "as low as reasonably practicable."In January this year, pipeline installation activities on Woodside’s Scarborough gas project were halted owing to a software anomaly. Saipem said that it was investigating the cause of the problem and had already started the remediation work. Although the anomaly ...