Larry Saha Room (Haydon-Allen 2175). Presented by Dr. Jan Hayes, Senior Research Fellow, School of Sociology, RSSS

There has never been a death or serious injury due to a high pressure gas pipeline leak in Australia.  The industry is proud of this fact, but also uneasy about the potential for complacency.  Australia’s pipeline industry is forecast to expand significantly in the next decade due to increasing domestic energy demand, large new export markets and the likely need for a carbon dioxide network to support planned developments in carbon capture and storage.  In aiming to maintain this safety record in an expanding environment, the Australian pipeline industry is taking the unique step of engaging seriously with the social science research available from other high hazard industries about how to prevent accidents from happening.  This work is being done under the auspices of the new Energy Pipelines Cooperative Research Centre (EPCRC).
The experience from other sectors says that serious accidents are rarely the result of previously unknown technical mechanisms.  Accidents occur when technical knowledge is not applied in a particular case for a range of social and organisational reasons.  The challenge in accident prevention is therefore related to those social and organisational factors.  So far, the CRC has plans for five pieces of research in this area:
•    Incentive schemes for senior managers – how can pipeline integrity be included?
•    The impact of organisational design on the influence of public safety/pipeline integrity specialists. 
•    Thinking about safety across the design process and into operations. 
•    Work practices that lead to pipeline damage due to external interference. 
•    Professionalism and young engineers – how do younger members of the profession view their safety responsibilities?
The CRC’s plans also include two seminar series, one for senior pipeline company executives and another for a more general industry audience.  The CRC is in the early stages of this journey and is actively seeking broad industry involvement both in Australia and from overseas pipeline companies.