Implementing BORA in oil and gas process case study:Algerian industry

Abstract

This paper intends to present and implement a Barrier and Operational Risk Analysis (BORA) approach in oil and gas process in Algerian industry. This recent approach, despite of its analysis which based on the basic and classical methods such as barrier block diagrams, fault trees (FT) and influence diagrams. It is considered very suitable and practical in terms of decisionmaking as regards to risk analysis. In fact, Barrier block diagrams are applied to illustrate the accident scenarios including the functioning of safety barriers. Fault trees are used to analyze the performance of safety barriers. While the influence diagrams are used in order to analyze the effects of risk influencing factors (RIFs) on the initiating event (IE) and basic events relating to safety barriers. This study aims at showing: (1) the applicability and feasibility of BORA as approach in oil and gas process in Algerian industry, and(2) the advantages and limitations of its implementation concerning the lack of information and the use expert judgment for quantifying the risk influencing factors of each initiating and basic events. At last, some perspectives about these limitations were presented in order to improve this approach. For that, BORA is applied on an operational process, a combustible gas balloon (G01-VN-45-01) within the unit of gas treatment (UTGA), Sonatrach, Algeria).