Design and development of a novel knowledge-based decision support system for industrial safety management at drilling process

Abstract

Purpose Annually, hundreds of drilling crew suffer from major injuries during performing oil and gas drilling operation because of the deficiency of an adequate hazard safety management system for real-time decision-making in hazardous conditions. According to previous studies, there is a sheer industrial need for an effective industrial safety management decision support system for accident prevention at oil and gas drilling sites at both drilling domains. Therefore, this paper aims to focus on the design and development of knowledge base decision support system (KBDSS) for the prevention of hazardous activities at Middle Eastern and South Asian origins’ onshore and offshore oil and gas industries during drilling operations. Design/methodology/approach In this study, data were gathered from safety and health professionals from targeted oil and gas industries in Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan through quantitative and qualitative approaches. Based on identified data, KBDSSs (HAZFO Expert 1.0) were systematically developed and designed by adopting Database Development Life Cycle and Waterfall Software Development Life Cycle models. MySQL and Visual Studio 2015 software were used for developing and designing knowledge base and graphical user interface of the system. Findings KBDSS (HAZFO Expert 1.0) for accident prevention at onshore and offshore oil and gas drilling industries based on identified potential hazards and their suitable controlling measures aligned with international safety standards and regulations. HAZFO Expert 1.0 is a novel KBDSS that covers all onshore and offshore drilling operations with three and nine outputs, respectively, to achieve the current trend of Industry Revolution 4.0 and Industrial IoTs for workforce safety. Practical implications This industrial safety management system (HAZFO Expert 1.0) will be efficiently used for the identification and elimination of potential hazards associated with drilling activities at onshore and offshore drilling sites with an appropriate hazard controlling strategy. Originality/value Moreover, the developed KBDS system is unique in terms of its architecture and is dynamic in nature because it provides HAZFO Expert 1.0 data management and insertion application for authorized users. This is the first KBDSS which covers both drilling domains in Malaysian, Saudi Arabian and Pakistani industries.

Development of a novel safety and health educational management information system (HAZ-PRO) for oil and gas production operation

“…A mixed-methods study employs sequential use of different methods rather than the integration of data analysis (Muhammad et al , 2019a, 2019b). The sequential (explanatory, exploratory and embedded) method uses both quantitative and qualitative data, which are implemented and connected at different phases.…”

“…While, for the development of graphical user interface of safety and health educational management information system, Visual Studio VB.NET will be used for its user-friendly environment and ability of handling almost any amount of data, up to as much as 50 million rows or more (Hassan et al , 2017; Utvik and Jahre-Nilsen, 2016). Similarly, for inference engine, rule base method with structural quires will be adopted, because rule base method provides natural knowledge representation and deal with incomplete and uncertain knowledge (Muhammad et al , 2019a, 2019b; Peppard and Ward, 2016). Similarly, MySQL (2015) will be used for the development of knowledge base (KB) of the proposed safety and health management information system (HAZ-PRO) along with expert opinion for drilling accident prevention activities based on health and safety rules.…”

“…Table I highlight the detailed overview of oil and gas production disasters along with investigated causes and number of fatalities and injuries among drilling crew in past eighteen (18) years. As it is depicted form the Table I, that most of the oil and gas disasters and accidents were happened during drilling process at Middle Eastern (Saudi Arabia) and Asian (Malaysia and Pakistan) countries owing to the environmental diversity and lack of industrial safety and health practices and effective accidents preventive resources for both production domains (Muhammad et al , 2019a, 2019b; Asad et al , 2018a, 2018b).…”

“…Furthermore, based on the detailed literature review from over past 10 years’ different safety and health management information system have been developed for oil and gas production operation worldwide (Asad et al , 2014). But there is no such safety and health management information system available in the industries with mutually integrated onshore and offshore oil and gas production operations based on effective hazard controlling factors and mitigating measures (Hassan et al , 2017; Muhammad et al , 2019a, 2019b). Table II reflects the name of existing online resources and modules for health and safety of oil and gas and their countries with industrial domain based on detailed literature review.…”

“…In the years 2008-2015, the occupational fatality rate of the oil and gas drilling industry was 2.5 times higher than the construction industry and seven times higher than general industry (Asad et al , 2018a, 2018b). This industry’s fatal injury rate is correlated with fluctuations of industry activity, as measured by the number of active oil and gas production rigs (Muhammad et al , 2019a, 2019b). Fatality rates are highest during production operation, which demands increased efforts for improved safety strategies at oil and gas production sites (Handal, 2013).…”