In recent times the Committee has undertaken the following projects.

Publication of Construction Safety Guidelines

The guidelines provide advice on the incorporation of health and safety issues in the overall preparation of project construction safety plans. The two parts to the guidelines are firstly the key considerations in the preparation of the safety plan including guidance on safety management systems and safety assessments, and secondly key health and safety issues on which the Committee will progressively provide further guidance.

APIA have, through its Chief Executive, met with all the state technical regulators to encourage the use of the Safety Guidelines to the extent that APIA’s Environmental Guidelines are promoted and used.

Article continues below…

It is important that APIA receives feedback on the application of the Safety Guidelines in the pipeline industry.

Fatigue Management

This project focused on the work practices of the pipeline industry, including work rosters and hours worked per day. The question we asked ourselves was did the work practices impact on the safety and wellbeing of employees?

The University of Queensland was engaged and after interviewing members and conducting a seminar/workshop, a report was issued which concluded that members did exhibit a duty of care to their employees and managed fatigue of the workforce to ensure no impact on employees health and safety.

The Fatigue Management guidelines were issued at the 2006 APIA Convention.

Revision and Update of Previous Guidelines

The Safety Committee reviewed the following guidelines last year and re-issued them at the 2006 APIA Convention:

* Hydrostatic Testing Guidelines * Vehicle Safety Guidelines

Implementation of Construction Safety Statistics

The Committee has instituted the collection of safety lag indicators, LTS, MTI’s from its members, to publish on the APIA website and importantly benchmark against other industries and provide data for pipeline industry participants.

Members are encouraged to submit their statistics on a quarterly basis to Steve Dobbie at APIA. The collected data is published on the APIA website and no member company is identified.

The aim of the Committee is to include lead indicator statistics from members in the near future.

The following are the current Safety Committee projects.

4WD Vehicle Safety and Driver Behaviour

The construction and operation of pipelines involves employees driving millions of kilometres in 4WD vehicles over varying terrain and remote environments. Typically for a pipeline project of six to nine months duration, 5 to 6 million kilometres are driven.

The Committee’s concern is that the majority of our 4WDs do not incorporate the latest technology for example electronic stability control, which assist drivers in avoiding accidents and incidents. The motor vehicle industry has included technology in various other vehicle models and studies have shown that a 50 per cent reduction in rollover type accidents does occur.

All involved in the pipeline industry place critical importance on driver training whether it be 4WD or defensive driving. However the concern is that there are still too many accidents and incidents and there is a need to study driver behaviour to establish what else can be done to eliminate accidents and incidents.

Monash University has been engaged to work with the Safety Committee to produce a report through a questionnaire, interview and seminar process with members during 2007 with the aim of issuing guidelines at the 2007 APIA Convention.

Hand Grinders

The identification of a user friendly and safer hand grinder is currently the subject of a new guideline to be issued this year.

Working in Remote Locations

Many of our pipeline projects are in very remote locations and the guideline will draw on the varied experience of our members.