OREANDA-NEWS.  September 07, 2012. His Excellency Dr. Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Sada, Minister of Energy & Industry and Chairman and Managing Director of Qatar Petroleum (QP), awarded a total of seven companies from QP’s joint ventures and contractors as winners in the second running of the Qatar Oil & Gas Industry Safety Excellence and Innovation Awards, reported the press-centre of QP.  

Initiated under the guidance of H.E. Dr. Al-Sada, the Safety Excellence and Innovation Awards primarily aims to recognize outstanding safety programs and initiatives being implemented in the oil & gas industry and to promote continual improvement in the safety performance of oil & gas companies as well as the sharing of best practices.

“We cannot be complacent with the way we manage the HSE risks associated with our industry,” HE Dr. Al-Sada stressed in his keynote address, as he emphasized the important role of leadership in driving the continual improvement process. “There’s a common element that can be found in all the award-winning submissions over the past two years – that is, the very clear and visible involvement of senior management. It goes a long way in bringing about any real successful safety improvement initiatives.”

Launched in 2010, the Qatar Oil & Gas Industry Safety Excellence and Innovation Awards is being administered by the Corporate Health, Safety, Environment (HSE) of QP. Under the program, oil & gas companies operating in the country were invited to submit their ongoing safety programs and initiatives for consideration. An independent team of judges then evaluated all the submissions against a pre-established set of criteria. After establishing a short list, a second round of judging subsequently took place in the form of an audiovisual presentation. 

As unanimously selected by the panel of judges, the following are the winners of the Safety Excellence and Innovation Awards 2011 under the QP Joint Ventures Category: Qatar Chemical Company (Q-Chem) bagged the Gold Award for its “Spotlight on Process Safety”; Qatar Petrochemical Company (QAPCO) won the Silver Award for its “Critical Functions Analysis Study”; and Dolphin Energy Limited got the Bronze Award for its “Looking through the Eyes of Risk Initiative.”

For the QP Contractors Category, Schlumberger won the Gold Award for its “Journey Management & Driving Procedure”; Consolidated Contractors received the Silver Award for its “HSE Awareness & Communication Initiative”; and Qatar Kentz was named for the Bronze Award for its “Improving Safety Performance Program.”

This year, the panel of judges also elected to present a special Innovation Award to RasGas Company Limited (RasGas) for its “Safety Ambassador Programme.”  This programme is unique in that it targets the future generation of workers by engaging young people who are still in school.

H.E. Dr. Al-Sada presented all the winners with Certificates of Safety Excellence and congratulated them on their achievements. He encouraged those who did not win an award this year to continue the hard work on improving their safety initiatives and also challenged all participants to learn from each other through the sharing of best practices.

With the conclusion of the 2011 program, nominations for the Qatar Oil and Gas Industry Safety Excellence and Innovation Awards 2012 are now open and all oil & gas companies in the country are being invited to participate. Interested companies can request for a copy of the submission template by sending an e-mail to hse.excellence @ qp.com.qa