A review of human reliability assessment methods for proposed application in quantitative risk analysis of offshore industries

Abstract

Issues related to Human Factors have emerged as the prolific cause for a multitude of offshore incidents. This has led to an increased emphasis on studying and quantifying human elements in this domain. A conventional method applied to evaluate the risk associated with offshore platforms under both drilling and operations is quantitative risk analysis (QRA). Human reliability analysis (HRA) approaches have been developed that incorporate human performance and the resulting human errors in QRA for a more holistic overview of the associated risks with offshore facilities. However, due to the complex socio-technical nature of the offshore industry, the effective integration of HRA in QRA has remained a challenge. In this study, we have reviewed various HRA methods applied in offshore domain along with various QRA methods that facilitate HRA integration. The study revealed that the offshore domain mainly utilizes first-generation HRA methods for QRA of offshore emergency scenarios and second-generation methods for normal design and operation. It was also observed that certain QRA methods were more compatible with specific HRA techniques depending on the nature of the HRA technique.