Integrated framework for safety management and uncertainty management

Safety management and uncertainty management have traditionally been completely separate functions. The two disciplines are, to a large extent, based on different scientific pillars. The safety discipline typically produces frequency estimates of specific hazardous events, whereas the uncertainty discipline produces prediction intervals based on probability distribution quantiles, in addition to mean values. Furthermore, the safety discipline has a focus on risk acceptance criteria, whereas the uncertainty discipline makes top-ten and similar lists to rank the most critical uncertainty aspects. These differences make it difficult to obtain an integrated framework for safety management and uncertainty management. However, the recent introduction of risk perspectives highlighting the uncertainty component of risk has provided an improved basis for development of such an approach. By seeing risk as a two-dimensional concept covering events and consequences on the one side and uncertainties on the other, the content and boundaries of risk assessments are changed. The gap between the two disciplines can, to a large extent, be bridged. The purpose of the current paper is to present and discuss an integrated framework for these disciplines and traditions, based on this risk perspective. The starting point is petroleum operations, but the discussion is, to a large extent, general.