Clarifying the concept of operational risk assessment in the oil and gas industry

There is an increasing interest in risk and safety research to reflect risk fluctuations in operational phase to avoid major accidents from happening. A structured review that covers operational risk assessment, dynamic risk assessment and real-time risk assessment has been conducted to clarify the concept of operational risk that needs to be assessed under operational risk assessment. It is found that different terms are used in different ways, covering different purposes. The finding reveals a need to strengthen the link between risk assessment methodologies and supporting decisions by clarifying what needs to be measured for what purpose. Operational risk assessment, dynamic risk assessment, and real-time risk assessment have their key aspects to address, namely what information we need to make decisions, how the analysis is updated and how the data required for updating is gathered. The paper recommends using the terms in a consistent way to facilitate a common understanding.