Reporting to SafeOCS
In August 2013, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) and BTS signed an interagency agreement to develop and implement SafeOCS, a voluntary program for confidential reporting of “near misses” occurring in the OCS. This program serves as a resource to help industry capture and share key lessons from significant near-miss and other safety events, with the objective of preventing, identifying, and mitigating potential high-consequence risks. On September 7, 2016, BSEE published a Production Safety Systems Rule (PSSR) substantially revising 30 CFR part 250, subpart H (2016 PSSR) (81 FR 61834). That final rule addressed issues such as production safety systems, subsurface safety devices, and safety device testing, including safety and pollution prevention equipment (SPPE). These systems play a critical role in protecting workers and the environment. Most of the provisions of that rulemaking took effect on November 7, 2016. In August 2016, BSEE and the BTS entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to allow BTS to collect equipment failure data and other safety reports required under BSEE rules for safety and pollution prevention equipment (SPPE). On October 26, 2016, the BSEE director announced the expansion of the SafeOCS program beyond near miss reporting to include the confidential collection of equipment failure data pursuant to regulations 30 C.F.R.§ 250.803. In September 2018, BSEE published revisions to the 2016 Production Safety Systems Rule (PSSR), which clarifies provisions for SPPE failure reporting. More specifically, pursuant to 30 CFR § 250.803, effective December 27, 2018, operators must report the following:
*Currently, the designee of the Chief of OORP is the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS). Operators submit this information through www.SafeOCS.gov, where it is received and processed by BTS. Reports submitted through www.SafeOCS.gov are collected and analyzed by BTS and protected from release under the Confidential Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency ACT(CIPSEA) (44 U.S.C.101) |
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All oil and gas operators on the OCS are required by BSEE to report failures of safety and pollution prevention equipment (SPPE) under 30 C.F.R. § 250.803 of BSEE's Production Safety Systems Rule. Operators are required to submit SPPE failure reports directly to BTS as BSEE's designee under the regulations for the collection of SPPE failure data and reports. All operators must follow the failure reporting requirements contained in the following ANSI/API Standards:
Within 30 days after the discovery and identification of the failure, operators must provide a written notice of equipment failure to the manufacturer of such equipment and to BTS as BSEE’s designated a third party.
The SafeOCS reporting system is operated by BTS. BSEE does not have access to reports that are submitted to BTS.
Any reports submitted to BTS for inclusion in SafeOCS are accessible only by BTS authorized personnel and BTS-designated agents under CIPSEA. As an independent federal statistical agency, BTS has the authority and obligation under CIPSEA and the agency's authorizing statute to protect the confidentiality of your data, including but not limited to company information, personally identifiable information, and sensitive or proprietary information. By submitting to BTS, your data are protected from release to the public, BSEE, and other non-CIPSEA federal agencies. Data are also protected from subpoenas and Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
In contrast, equipment failure reports submitted directly to BSEE do not enjoy CIPSEA protections, and could be subject to release under the FOIA or other authority.
All failures of safety and pollution prevention equipment (SPPE) must be reported. An equipment failure is any condition that prevents the equipment from meeting the functional specification or purpose.
A written notice of equipment failure must be provided within 30 days after the discovery and identification of the failure. An investigation and a failure analysis must also be performed within 120 days of the failure to determine the cause of the failure.
Please follow the link below to submit a report:
• Safety and Pollution Prevention EquipmentIt links to a separate page that will request event, equipment, lease/company, and other information. All reports and follow-up investigations should be submitted to BTS.
BSEE carefully analyzed all 484 provisions in the original 2016 Production Safety Systems Rule and determined that 84 of those provisions – less than 18 percent of the original rule – were appropriate for revision or deletion. The final rule also adds seven new provisions.
The Final Rule includes, but is not limited to, the following revisions:
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) has released the 2017 Annual Report: Blowout Prevention System Safety, which provides information on equipment component failures occurring during drilling and non-drilling operations on rigs in the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). The reporting of such events is mandated by the Well Control Rule (WCR), published by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), Department of the Interior. The publication of this report represents a groundbreaking collaboration between industry and government stakeholders and is a significant milestone in promoting safety on the OCS. The report includes an analysis of equipment component failures and other key information such as root causes of failure events, follow-up response to failures, and opportunities to improve data quality. In 2017, the first full year of mandated WCR reporting, 18 of 25 operators in the Gulf of Mexico reported 1,129 rig equipment component failure events, and the notifications involved 45 of 59 rigs operating in the Gulf of Mexico. The 18 reporting operators represent 90.2 percent of new wells drilled in the Gulf of Mexico. The report begins by analyzing aggregate equipment component failure data and then, in separate sections, presents statistics on the reported events for the two major types of BOP stacks (subsea and surface). Both types of BOP stacks were associated with component failures and most notifications were associated with the more complex subsea BOP stack (92.5 percent).
Key findings:![]() |
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