Asking the Right Questions

Richard Feynman was a major icon in physics for over 6 decades. This is almost an unheard of feat primarily because the careers of most physicists, even the great ones, are winding down when they are in their 40’s.

Feynman told stories – making a lot of them up - about many things and one, about his father, concerned the name of a particular bird, the Spencer’s Warbler. When he and his father saw this bird, his father named the bird in a variety of languages, then said:

“You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird. You’ll only know about humans in different places , and what they call the bird. So let’s stop looking at the bird and see what it’s doing – that’s what counts.”

Feynman learned to ask questions about everything; he deconstructed physics; he re-worked all propositions from their beginnings and took nothing for granted. This took time and effort but was well worth it.

In 1956, experimental physics had shown there was a serious discrepancy with theoretical physics. Theoretical physicists cherished the idea of parity conservation, in simple terms that the universe was neither right or left handed. Experimental results on a particular sub-atomic particle (Tau Lepton) could not be explained. Feynman had the imagination and courage to ask “What would be the consequences if the parity rule was wrong.” He simply asked the right question. Perhaps you had to be there, but this was a turning point in science.

In a perfect world, every assumption should be examined no matter how much time and effort it takes. In computer jargon with wrong assumptions you get “garbage in – garbage out”. Let’s look at a few examples:

Ø does electronic messaging really have value rather than just making it simpler or faster

Ø tenure in education (what purpose does it serve now)

Ø assumed probability of unusual or rare events (calculated without sufficient information)

Ø economic theories based on people acting logically (they do not)

There are an infinite number of these. Great historical figures are no longer relevant today because they made wrong assumptions. Marx and and to a lesser extent Freud are good examples.

The problem is that most of us do not have the desire, the ability or the time to research every subject, figure out if there are assumptions and then determine the validity of the assumptions. Nor to affect outcomes if we discover the assumptions don’t make sense.

Look at this example for digital cameras – there has been a continual and inexorable increase in megapixiels. Megapixels sell cameras. But if you increase in number of megapixels without increasing in the size of the card capturing the image, you get a noise problem which is detrimental to picture quality ie you have not improved anything. Instead, why not look at how to make better use of the light which enters the lens but is lost due to inefficiency. The same applies to solar panels where approximately 80% of the energy is wasted. Scientists and engineers are looking at both of these problems. They are related but I’m not sure the engineers have realized this just yet.

Looking at assumptions is fertile ground for litigation lawyers and expert witnesses. Expert reports, appraisals, business plans, and many other documents we rely on are based on assumptions. Being a critical reader and open to changes and alternatives and always questioning is the hallmark for intelligent examination of issues and will facilitate a better outcome. Like democracy, questioning and deconstructing is messy and time consuming, but there is no better system.

I confess that I have not always questioned nearly enough. Often it is only in hindsight that I realize this failure. I suppose I will have to try harder.

Blow-Outs - Deja Vu

Man-made disasters never fail to fascinate us.

In the autumn of 1982 near Drayton Valley, Alberta, a town about 140 Km south west of Edmonton, Amoco Oil was drilling a sour gas well. Sour gas contains hydrogen sulphide (H2S), a very corrosive gas which combines with water to form sulphuric acid. In low concentrations H2S smells like rotten eggs. In high concentrations, humans are unable to smell it and it is deadly. Amoco had experienced a serious blow-out in the same gas field five years earlier. You can find out more about Amoco’s history of disasters on-line.

Early in the morning, troubles began at the well-head and within hours the well was out of control spewing H2S in vast quantities.  This blow-out was known as the Lodgepole blow-out and was the worst blow-out in Alberta's long history of oil and gas exploration. On some days, the rotten-egg odour could be smelled as far away as Winnipeg, nearly 1,500 kilometres distant. Needless to say Edmonton and other communities in the vicinity of the blowout were in a state of serious anxiety.

Sour gas flowed at an estimated rate of 150 million cubic feet (4,200,000 m3) per day.

The H2S content of the gas was 28 per cent, and the well also produced 20,000 barrels per day (3,200 m3/d) of sulfur-contaminated, orange-coloured condensate which was emitted into the atmosphere deposited around the well-site. The well was out of control for 68 days, during 23 of which the well was not ignited. During that time H2S from the blow-out took the lives of two blow-out specialists and sent another 16 people to hospital.

In early 1983 I received a call from the Energy Resources Conservation Board, the oil and gas regulatory authority for Alberta, asking me to act as inquiry counsel for an inquiry the Board was convening to investigate the blow-out. The job entailed reviewing the events leading up to and following the blow-out, gathering evidence from Amoco, contractors on site, government departments who were responsible for disaster planning and public protection, municipalities and environmental groups. I had to cross-examine all of the people involved. I accepted and began a task that took my full time for 1 ½ years and continued until early 1984. I learned a lot about blow-outs, the oil industry and government.

I was given a relatively free hand to investigate the causes of the blow-out and the response of Government to it, the environmental damages, and ultimately to assist the Board in determining how the industry should be regulated in the future. It is ironic to note that in 1998 Amoco merged with BP.

This is obviously timely because of the current situation BP is experiencing with the blow-out of their Deepwater Horizon Well in the Gulf of Mexico. A few examples may serve to illustrate how little certain players in the oil industry, have learned about drilling and safety.

There is a lengthy front page article in the Sunday New York Times which outlines the “hodgepodge of oversight agencies that grated exceptions to the rules, allowed risks to accumulate and made a disaster more likely.”

Later in the same article:

“As early as June 2009, BP engineers had expressed concerns in internal documents about using certain casings for the well because they violated [BP’s] safety and design guidelines. There were kicks in the well more than 5 weeks before the disaster and a pipe was stuck in the well. The blow-out preventer, when tested on at least three occasions was leaking fluids."

As the headline of the article states, it was not clear who was in charge. BP could make more money by completing its drilling job quickly because it was paying a leasing fee to the rig owner, Transocean, thus creating a natural conflict of interest. The desire to cut corners and save money is not uncommon in industry. Especially when there is a perception of low risk of an event occurring without proper consideration of the consequences if the event actually happens.

As is the case in most complex industrial accidents, there are many events leading up  and contributing to to the incident.  The headlines and articles from Lodgepole will sound familiar to those of you who are following the Gulf blow-out:  Here are extracts from some of them [I acutally got them out from storage!]

"Was Blowout Avoidable - repair equipment for the Amoco well was ordered seven hours before it blew wild...But the equipment did not arrive on time.."

"Foreman battled runaway well alone for 17 hours..."

"Mud study warned Amoco of sour gas dangers..."  "Mud used before blowout less than recommended..."

"Safety tests unrecorded..."  "Amoco records: vital tests not done..."

"Blowout problems minimized by firm..."

"Amoco production manager...told the inquiry the company was aware some possibility of striking sour gas existed, but reluctantly admitted no probability assessment of hitting the gas was conducted or asked for..."

"Tests not done before blowout...Amoco..records indicate that crucial safety drills and function tests were not performed in the days immediately prior to the blowout..."

"It's our secret: Amoco" - headline in reference to Amoco's refusal to disclose its emergency response plan.

Let's use the blow-out preventer (BOP) as an example in the BP blowout.  The BOP is the device which is perched on top of the well head and is supposed to shut down the well if problems are encountered. In the BP case, the BOP was inaccessible, at great depth and subject to tons per square inch of pressure. It could obviously not be inspected visually.

Apart from fluid leaks in the BOP, BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles said interviews with Transocean [the owner of the rig] workers on the rig revealed crewmembers tried to activate the BOP from the rig's bridge before the fire forced them to evacuate, but the BOP did not close off the well.

Suttles also revealed that BP remotely-operated vehicles (ROVs) had hit "subsea access points" that should close the BOP, but that they also failed to trigger the mechanism to shut.

"We don't know why the BOP failed to stop the flow," he said. "Ultimately we will recover the BOP, get it to the surface and find out."

In the Lodgepole situation, the BOP was supposed to close after the drill pipe was removed. [Some undersea BOP’s have a cutting edge which is supposed to cut the pipe when the BOP closes.]
As with BP, Amoco estimated the amount of gas flowing from the well head. As with BP, Amoco’s original estimates were low. This is not surprising as the higher the estimate of the flow, the more dangerous the situation would appear to the public and regulatory authorities. As with BP, it turned out the flow was considerably higher than originally anticipated. This had dramatic consequences for Lodgepole. The Amoco engineers decided they could control the blow-out by opening the BOP, letting the drill stem drop into the drill hole, then close the BOP. They predicted the pipe would drop into the drill hole based on their estimate of upwards pressure from the flow. Needless to say they were astonished that when the BOP was opened, the drill stem shot 100’s of feet in the air, striking the rig and igniting the gas into a fiery inferno which totally destroyed the rig.

The saving grace was that when the blow-out ignited, the H2S was consumed by the fire so there was no further threat to people from breathing it. However, then the threat to the environment from the resulting emissions continued unabated. 

The fire destroyed the Nabors 14E rig (worth about $8 million) in nine minutes; it also scorched 400 acres (1.6 km2) of forest. Amoco's direct costs to bring the well under control were approximately $20 million. Huge amounts of natural gas, natural gas liquids and sulfur were wasted through the disaster. Apart from the environmental and health concerns, this meant energy lost to consumers, revenues lost to Amoco, and royalties and taxes lost to government. According to a Panel’s report from the Inquiry, these and other direct costs totalled about $200 million.

In my view in the case of Lodgepole, the government and regulatory authorities acted reasonably competently.  From the media reports, that does not appear to be the case before and immediately following the BP blow-out.  It is perhaps easy in hindsight to characterize activity around a well-site as without direction or chaotic.  There are always many participants - drillers, managers, representatives of the owner (BP), drilling mud specialists, pipe specialists, people taking out and reviewing core samples, etc.  But lack of planning for a serious incident, lack of concern as the well began showing signs of trouble, inadequate disaster planning, confusion and lack of direction from management and lack of coordination amongst the various people on and off site all would clearly contribute to a blow-out. The failure to stop the blowout and deal with envirnomental and other problems following the blow-out are another story.

From the editorial questions in the New York Times:

THE RESPONSE The questions about whether BP and the government responded quickly enough, and with the right weapons, could fill a book — and probably will. Both parties seem to have underestimated the size of the spill, and neither had a coherent underwater response plan in place. Though the oil industry had experienced blowouts at shallower depths, BP’s disjointed response suggested it had given little thought to the possibility of a blowout at 5,000 feet.

In my view, the BP blow-out manifests systematic problems permitting the human failures which possibly caused and undoubtedly contributed to the consequences.

Part 1 of the Lodgepole Inquiry dealt with events and responses. Part 2 dealt with what the industry and the Board should do to prevent another disaster.  In the case of Lodgepole, the inquiry spawned a generation of safety regulations that require the industry to designate hazardous drilling targets as "critical wells" and to use elaborate safety precautions at the drill site. The new regulations imposed much more stringent drilling procedures at critical wells, required specialized safety features on drilling and other equipment, and forced companies to develop detailed emergency response plans before beginning to drill.

While acting as Inquiry Counsel, I observed the vast resources the Oil and Gas Industry could bring to its operations and to its legal problems. Many commentators recognize that regulatory authorities and industry cooperate and have a “cosy” relationship which can result in compromises and tacit agreements on procedures and safety. Undoubtedly many heads will roll over the BP disaster placing the blame on those supposedly responsible for approving actions which were in accordance with accepted practice and policies and essentially condoned.

There are good players and bad players in every industry. The BP blow-out will obviously result in changes to off-shore drilling. It will cost the industry dearly – and not just the bad players. Let’s hope the changes will make drilling safer rather than merely give us the impression of safety as is the case with many of the measures implemented after 9/11 by Homeland Security.

I also believe that the good players have a corporate culture which engenders prudent, safe practices and honest open dialogue among team members and the bad players emphasize savings and cutting corners, disregard or underestimate risk and stifle dissenting opinions. It would be interesting to be a fly on the wall in the boardrooms of the major oil companies to hear their opinions on the BP blow-out and on the cost to them in the future.  It is reminiscent of the Canadian Government and banks opposing the proposed international bank levy, saying why should we pay when we acted properly and in fact already paid by foregoing risky subprime mortgages and hedges.

As a personal aside, the Pembina Institute, one of the leading environmental activist NGO's in Canada was created following the Lodgepole Blowout by Rob McIntosh who was the organizer of the Drayton Valley Community in its participation in the Inquiry.  Mark Lowey, a journalist who covered the Blowout, continued his career as an environmental writer and today publishes a respected news journal on environmental issues.

I was usurped by the New York Times Sunday Magazine on another aspect of this story which I was thinking about yesterday. The article entitled “Underestimating Risk – What the oil spill and the financial crisis have in common” discusses the human tendency to underestimate risk and the comparisons between the blow-out and the financial crisis - but that is to be continued.