Health, Safety, and Environment
Being aware of the nature and the scope of own activity impact and understanding the responsibility, the Company tries to achieve its strategic goal – the leadership in provision of safe operation and workspaces, protection of its employees’ health, as well as mitigation of environmental impact in the regions of Company operation.
Integrated HSE Management System
The integrated HSE management system is a part of the Company’s management system. It is used for implementation of the HSE policy and achievement of the Company’s goals in the sphere of health, safety, and environment protection, as well as risk and environmental aspects management.
In 2018, an independent certification center conducted a regular certification audit of the Company’s HSE IMS compliance with the following standards: ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Management Systems. Requirements with Guidance for Use; OHSAS 18001:2007 Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems. Requirements. The results of the certification audit confirmed the management system compliance, so the certificates were issued, and the number of certified Group Subsidiaries increased from 51 to 57.
Contractor Relations
The works and services agreements shall mandatory include the standard Appendix “Health, Safety, and Environment Requirements to the Organizations Involved in the Works and Services Provided at the Company’s Facilities” and responsibility in case of failure to comply with the requirements. The Appendix states the contractors’ responsibilities related to compliance with the HSE requirements, and the requirements related to personnel training and compulsory briefings, personal protective equipment, transport vehicles in operation, environment protection, prohibiting work permit for employees intoxicated with alcohol, narcotics, or any toxic substance.
Industrial Safety
Production activities focused on supporting the industrial safety of production facilities in 2018 included target programs, except for the standard ones, of annually implemented operations on diagnosis, maintenance, repair and overhaul.
In Upstream business, the basic Program on Improvement of the Rosneft’s Pipelines Reliability allowed to achieve the failure reduction goal resulting decreasing the environmental pollution level and increasing the pipelines safe operation period.
Due to the Program implementation in 2018 the pipelines failure rate decreased by 5.9% year-on-year.
Under Oil Refining and Petrochemicals business, a complex of Programs is implemented to ensure the equipment integrity and to prevent emergency conditions resulting in adverse environmental impact. Under the above mentioned programs, 177 pcs of the most critical pipelines were replaced, 319 blind areas of the process pipelines were eliminated, and 2,062 elements of pipelines were replaced in order to ensure compliance of the material used with the operational conditions.
In Commerce and logistics business, the Company successfully began implementing the first phase of target HSE Program on Equipping Petroleum Product Tanks at the Oil Depot Facilities with Process Equipment, Monitoring Systems for Hydrocarbons Vapor Concentration in the Atmosphere, and Ventilation Systems. The system will ensure safety of the working spaces and more efficient control over the operational processes. Installation of the siphon drains / stripping nozzles will minimize the risks of unfavorable events during tanks and vessels stripping operations.
In 2018, due to the Company’s comprehensive and intense activities aimed to ensure industrial safety the amount of accidents decreased by more than 55% (from 11 to 6).
Occupational Safety and HealthAs at the date of the Report publishing, Health and Safety indexes for years 2016-2017 were configured considering all the Group Subsidiaries being under the Rosneft operational management.
The managers at all levels identify clear HSE goals according to unified Principles of Company’s leadership and priority in life, health and safe working conditions. Activities of the employees and contractors shall comply with the Golden Rules of Labor Safety; they must make provisions to stop the works in case of danger to human life or health.
The Golden Rules of Labor Safety are brief and demonstrative instructions for ten most dangerous work types. The Rules have been introduced in the Company since 2014; they contribute to the employees safety during all production activities.
Rosneft regularly arranges and holds activities ensuring traffic safety, and implements the initiatives preventing the road accidents.
The Company put in place the Regulations on Transport Safe Operation Management System, which specify requirements to the transport vehicles, equipment and drivers and apply to the Company, contractors and subcontractors. According to the Regulations, as of the end of 2018, 83% of vehicles were equipped with the in-vehicle monitoring systems, and 71% of vehicles were equipped with event data recorders.
Employees’ knowledge and expertise in the field of labor safety are necessary to ensure the works safety. The Company establishes and strictly controls the process of compulsive personnel training, including the Labor Safety Course.
Besides compulsive training, the Company extensively implements the programs of additional in-house training in the field of labor safety. The Company implemented the training practice by efforts of in-house coaches among the Company’s employees, who develop the courses on urgent subjects in the field of labor safety. As at 2018, 587 in-house coaches were trained at the Company. During the reporting period, 421 training courses were organized and 5,622 employees were trained at the internal corporate courses, Leadership in Health and Safety, Incident Investigation, HSE Risk Assessment and Management. In 2018, total number of hours for additional in-house training in labor safety was above 300,000 hours.
FAR change in 2018 is linked with a flight accident at the Vankor field, when the transportation services were rendered to the Company by a contractor.
The Company assumes the responsibility for saving the people’s life and health whether they work at the Company or at contractors/subcontractors. To strengthen the control over such accidents prevention the Company urgently developed and implemented the following measures:
- arranging the air navigation servicing directly at the Vankor landing field and signing a contract on flight-information service establishing
- implementing the multilevel Company’s air support monitoring system, which includes technical aviation audit of the contractor airlines
Environmental Protection
Environmental care is an integral part of Rosneft’s corporate culture and social responsibility. Rosneft follows the principle of responsible attitude to the environmental issues. Managing the production processes, the Company accounts for full scope of data related to the environmental impact of the projects planned or being implemented.
In 2018, green investment amounted to RUB 45.6 bln. Over the last five years, the Company’s green investment amounted to over RUB 240 bln.
Waste Management and Land Reclamation
In 2018, the area of accumulated petroleum-contaminated soils reduced by 14%, disposal volume of runoff and spilled oil and petroleum products decreased by 7% and 9%, respectively, the volume of treated petroleum-contaminated wastes exceeded their annual formation by 15% year-on-year.
90% of the accumulated petroleum-contaminated wastes are considered to be “historical heritage”, the wastes generated in the past by business operations of the third parties and located at the territories and/or facilities currently operated/exploited by the Company.
In collaboration with Rosatom the Company implements the target innovative project No.140 focused on developing the technology for treatment of petroleum-contaminated wastes with high radionuclide content.
The regions of the Company’s operation do not belong to the regions with water supply deficit. The other parties are provided with free access to all water bodies directly or indirectly used for the Company’s benefits according to the access provided by the government bodies. The water bodies are generally accessible for all parties concerned, and fauna forms.
Rosneft fulfils the requirements set by the legislation concerning the water resources utilization through timely infrastructure repair and retrofit and implementation of the best available technologies. The Company continuously monitors the environmental conditions allowing to take timely measures minimizing the environmental impact.
In 2018, the volume of reclaimed and serially reused water remained at the level of previous reporting period (about 93% in gross volume of water used for production needs).
Under the Agreement concerning interaction with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Russian Federation and the Federal Service for Supervision in the Sphere of Natural Resource Use the Company implements eight top-priority environmental projects. Six of them are intended to improve water quality and to increase efficiency of its use. The following projects were implemented in this area:
- complex of biological treatment plants at Bashneft-Ufaneftekhim, which is unprecedented in Russia and in Eurasia countries and which was commissioned in 2018 to provide treatment of production, storm, and house wastewater at Bashneft Refinery and 66 local plants and to reduce abstraction of river water by 2.5 times through the use of treated wastewater;
- completed construction of treatment facility comprising the membrane bioreactor at Novokuibyshevsk Refinery intended to increase the treatment efficiency and to reduce the fresh water consumption at full automation of process.
In 2018, the Company allocated over RUB 1.2 bln for these projects implementation.
Oil and Petroleum Products Spillage Prevention and Cleanup
The Company is aimed at prevention, reduction and minimization of oil and petroleum products spillage effects.
The Company has established and continues to develop the system for prompt response to oil and petroleum products spillages, for their containment and cleanup in order to minimize the environmental consequences, including impact on water resources. The activities to prevent oil and petroleum products spillage are carried out together with activities to improve the production facilities and the equipment reliability and provide sufficient resources for spillages isolation and cleanup. Following the target to reduce the volume of oil spillage, the Company implements the Pipelines Reliability Improvement Program. For example, in 2018 the volume of oil and petroleum products spillage decreased to 2.81 tonnes per 1 mmt of oil produced, i.e. 6% decrease year-on-year.
Biological Diversity Conservation
The Company has approved and implements the Program on conservation of marine ecosystems biological diversity at the Company’s license areas located in the Arctic region of the Russian Federation. Since 2012, the Company has been regularly implementing the comprehensive scientific-research expeditions focused on investigating the state of marine Arctic ecosystems; special attention is paid to marine mammals (walrus, seals) and polar bear populations; the programs of marine environment state monitoring are implemented at the license areas.
In 2018, under the Biological Diversity Conservation Program the Company:
- developed the Guidelines concerning prevention of collisions between human and polar bear for the companies operating in the Arctic Region;
- completed operations on environmental monitoring of marine ecosystem at the Medynsko-Varandeisky license area in the Pechora Sea;
- developed a technological form of microbial preparation based on the psychrophilic microorganisms intended for oil contamination disposal in the northern seas. The preparation being developed will allow to make a breakthrough in safe petroleum products disposal in marine environment at negative temperatures; this preparation can be used particularly to ensure environmental safety of the bunkering process at the sea, port area and oil terminals of the Company’s Arctic projects.
Under the International Convention on the Protection of the Black Sea against Pollution (Bucharest Convention), the legislation of the Russian Federation and the Rosneft’s Policy on Environmental Protection, since 2017, Rosneft has been financing the Black Sea dolphins study program implemented by the P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology. The first activities took place in September 2018. The results obtained are being analyzed and published, and serve as a basis for improvement of the methodological approaches to minimizing the industrial activities impact on the marine mammals.
Rosneft implements the projects concerning the biological diversity conservation in the regions of operation: the Evenki Deer at the Krasnoyarsk Territory; fish resources recovery in the rivers and water bodies of the Archangelsk, Vologda, Novosibirsk, Tyumen regions, the Krasnoyarsk Territory and the Krasnodar Territory, the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District, the Republic of Karelia, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia); monitoring of birds population at the territory of Upper Dvuobye swamplands at the Khanty-Mansijsk Autonomous District.
In 2018, the Company completed the works on artificial reproduction of water biological resources in order to compensate the possible damage to water biological resources and their environment. For this purpose about 3.6 mln valuable fish juveniles were released, including peled, Siberian sturgeon, grayling, red salmon, Atlantic salmon, Siberian salmon and muksun in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), the Krasnoyarsk Territory, the Kamchatka Territory, the Arkhangelsk Region, the Republic of Karelia and the Khanty-Mansijsk Autonomous District.
(WWF, Creon) to rank seven in 2018 from rank ten in 2017. Considering Information Disclosure category, the Company rose by eight points in the environmental responsibility rating: from rank ten to rank two compared to the previous period.
Combating Climate Change
As a party to United Nations Global Compact, the Company aims to reduce the impact on the climate change due to its activities. Rosneft–2022 Strategy make provisions for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The Company implements the Investment Gas Program and the Energy Saving Program aimed to prevent greenhouse gas emissions in the volume above 8 mmt of СО2-equivalent till 2022.
Investment Gas Program is mainly focused on the reduction of associated petroleum gas flaring to the level below 5% according to the target value stated by the Government of the Russian Federation. This can be achieved by means of comprehensive approach to the oil field construction: development of infrastructure for gas gathering, use and supplies to the consumers or gas re-injection in the reservoir.
Under implementation of the pilot project “Well flowback after hydraulic fracturing and gas condensate mixture treatment at Vostochno Urengoysky license area”, the average duration of well flowback operations after the hydraulic fracturing reduced from ten to two days providing for a significant decrease in methane flaring.
A temporary underground gas storage facility and gas compressor station for re-injection of gas being disposed in the reservoir were put into operation at JSC Verkhnechosnkneftegaz. RUB 8,787 mln were invested. Operation of the facilities will allow prevention of APG flaring exceeding 5% and provide a possibility of future appropriate use of the APG reinjected.
To reduce methane emissions during natural gas production, transportation and distribution, the Company consistently undertakes the following measures:
- prevention of atmospheric emissions without flaring through the use of technologies that ensure complete and safe flaring of the whole volume of the gas condensate mixture vented during repair and preventive maintenance;
- running of gas-dynamics surveys of wells without gas release to the atmosphere (surveys with separators);
- regular inspections of equipment and pipelines by the field personnel according to approved schedules and instructions;
- technical diagnosis of pipelines once every two years by expert organization in order to promptly detect the leaks in the equipment/pipelines.
As for greenhouse gas emission (GHG) rates, the Company demonstrates results comparable to the leading global oil and gas companies.