Nacap Australia takes out annual APIA Safety Award

The award was presented to Nacap by the Hon Tom Koutsantonis, MP, South Australian Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy, and Minister for Housing and Urban Development.

APIA President, Mr Kevin Lester, said the four nominations for the 2013 award were rigorously considered by an APIA committee comprising independent professionals which included State regulation experience. The committee noted the quality of nominations this year.

“There can only be one winner, however, and so it now gives me great pleasure to announce the winner of the 2013 APIA Safety Award to be the nomination from Nacap Australia for their Code Safe Success system,” he said.

Mr Lester said the committee chose the Code Safe Success system because:

  • The Nacap innovation recognised that English is the second language for many pipeline workers and that Safety Manuals are not always read, understood, remembered or accessible. Their use of QR code technology to access a simple video when the information was needed on each worker’s smart phone has made the safety check lists easily accessible onsite when they are most needed and delivered in a manner that can be readily understood and followed. This innovation should not only improve safety in the pipeline industry as Nacap is happy to share this but also has much broader application across other industries.

“It should be noted that Nacap recently took out the IPLOCA Safety Award for this new system so they have now scooped the pool.

“Congratulations to everyone involved with the development of the Nacap Code Safe Success system and to all of the companies that nominated for this year’s Safety Award.”

The APIA Safety Award is designed to recognise one or more of the following achievements, all of which aim to improve the safety of the pipeline industry and its personnel:

  • Outstanding safety performance in the workplace, whether in office, industrial, project, or operations and workplaces.
  • A unique innovation or initiative addressing a safety issue.
  • A new and well-defined safety system, procedure, or practice.

Previous winners of the APIA Safety award have been SEA Gas, DBP and WestNet Energy, the APA Group, AJ Lucas Group, Nacap Australia and McConnell Dowell.

The four nominations for the 2013 Safety award were as follow:

1. The first nomination was from the APA Group who nominated under the Outstanding Safety Performance criterion for their Wide Bay Pipeline Queensland – Emergency Response. The nomination covered the work completed during the rebuild of the pipeline and its reinstatement under the Burnett River after the extensive damage caused by severe weather and floods from ex-Tropical Cyclone Oswald on 30January 2013. It also highlighted the outstanding safety performance during this period of critical infrastructure repair and demonstrated APA’s Zero Harm Culture in action.

2. The second nomination was from Pipeline Plant Hire who nominated under the New and Well-Defined Safety System, Procedure or Practice criteria for their Use of Vacuum Lifting Equipment in the handling of pipe. The introduction of vacuum pipe handling equipment has resulted in an improvement in the safety of our industry by dramatically reducing the number of people being exposed to the dangers of handling large pipe.

3. The third nomination was from McConnell Dowell and the Consolidated Contractors Company through their MCJV who nominated under the Outstanding Safety Performance criterion for their QCLNG Narrows Crossing Project. The Narrows Crossing Project has been recognised for its outstanding safety performance across all aspects of the Project. The pipe-pull activity (completed on 25 February 2013) in particular went above and beyond this in complexity and in representing a world-class engineering achievement of simultaneous laying of two 42 inch gas pipelines across Gladstone Harbour safely.

4. The final nomination was from Nacap Australia who nominated under the Unique Innovation or Initiative criterion for their Code Safe Success system. This initiative redefines safety procedures and practices and has introduced a new and more efficient way of communicating high risk procedures to the workforce on pipeline construction sites. Building on the experience of longer term workers, Nacap turned to new technology by adopting QR scan codes to assist workers access in house filmed training videos.

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