WHAT ABOUT OIL SPILLS?
Oil spills are extremely rare and the risk requires tight management and strong regulatory control. All offshore industries use oil and oil derivatives to power the boats and vessels needed to perform myriad offshore activities, from transporting people in ferries to transporting oil in large cargo vessels. The risk of an oil or gas release exists with our activities too.
When you see or hear the word 'Risk', what does that mean to you?
WHAT IS RISK?
A risk is something that can happen, and generally there are instances of it happening before. We all live with risk every day. Importantly, everyone can, and does, manage risk in their everyday lives.
Whether we realise it or not, we all manage risk. When you wear a seatbelt in a car, what risk are you managing? Does wearing a seatbelt eliminate the risk? Or does a seatbelt help to reduce the risk to an acceptable level?
In the offshore oil and gas industry in Australia we identify the risks associated with our activities, and ways to control them, through detailed hazard identification and risk assessments. We use a risk assessment matrix, shown here, to evaluate and categorise our risks. When we think about managing our risks we start with: 'can we avoid the risk?' If the answer is no then we work through a hierarchy of controls to reduce the risk to as low as reasonably practicable.
MANAGING OIL SPILL RISK
We prevent oil spills during our projects and operations through detailed planning and engineering. If an oil spill does occur, we also have detailed plans to respond.
There are National and State contingency plans in place across Australia to respond in the event of a large oil spill from all the different types of offshore industry in Australian waters.
The oil and gas industry also has asset and activity-specific oil pollution emergency plans (OPEP) which link to the state and national contingency plans.
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WHERE COULD AN OIL SPILL GO?
If you live on the coast in Australia, you probably won't be too far from oil spill risk. The image above shows a Victorian Government assessment of oil spill risk along the coastline of Victoria. The assessment accounts for the various potential sources of oil spills. Oil spill risk is location specific. An area where there are a lot of large shipping vessels and industries, like Melbourne, will be at higher risk. An area remote from these things is at lower risk.
Cooper Energy's oil and gas facilities and activities are located offshore Victoria in the Otway and in the Gippsland Basins. The spill risk associated with these activities extends beyond these regions. As part of our detailed response planning, we have modelled where a spill from our offshore activities could travel to.
CONTACT US
We invite you to join our network and engage with us regarding our activities.
To find out more about Cooper Energy or our activities please contact us through the webform. We are keen to hear from people and organisations with functions, activities or interests within the areas we operate and to discuss how we interact and find out how we can work together.
Level 8, 70 Franklin Street, Adelaide, South Australia
Page last updated April 2023
08 8100 4900