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Interviews with employees "revealed a significant weakness in the quality of the work environment in [human resources]" and determined that the "majority of the [human resources] personnel interviewed do not believe that an open work environment [to express concerns] exists in HR."
"The HR Director, has a management style that her staff and peers view as aloof and ... confrontational," his report says. "Regardless of the factors giving rise to the current situation, the work environment in HR requires attention. A substantial segment of the workers mistrusts the organization's leader [Theresa Guim] and is reluctant to raise concerns. The situation ... must be addressed."
The report also said "morale is low" at the Valdez Terminal, where employees who respond to spills work. Thebaud's report said employees do not trust Kathy Zinn, Alyeska's Valdez Terminal director, because of her close ties to Hostler and her own brash management style. Numerous employees have left the Valdez Terminal in recent months and the report suggests that the departures may be directly related to Zinn's leadership.
Scrutiny Following Oil Spill
Alyeska has been the subject of intense scrutiny in recent months following a 4,500-barrel oil spill at one of its pump stations on the North Slope in May, which, according to a copy of a separate 17-page internal report into the circumstances behind that incident, was largely the result of the company continuously repeating past mistakes. The investigation was conducted by six Alyeska employees who have operational, maintenance, engineering and operational discipline experience as well as a process safety managment and Root Cause Analysis Subject Matter experct.
The spill at pump station 9, about 100 miles southwest of Fairbanks, resulted when oil started to flow back into the tank, after a backup battery system failed during a planned shutdown. Because the power was out and the facility was not manned with trained operators, no one recognized that the relief valves, which open during an outage, were discharging oil into the tank, which eventually overflowed and spilled. The incident forced Alyeska to shut down the pipeline for three days.
The facility is usually unmanned, another cost-cutting measure implemented by Alyeska as part of its long-delayed "strategic reconfiguration plan," an "efficiency" measure implemented by TAPS' owners to address declining oil production on Prudhoe Bay.
But a work crew was nearby at the time of the power outage because of the planned shutdown. The report said the pump station 9 was being shutdown in order to test the fire detection system, which includes isolation of primary power. During one of the tests, two uninterrupted power supply systems failed. The uninterrupted power supply was supposed to provide backup power, but when it failed, it caused critical station control systems to shut down.
When power is lost, five of the pump station's relief valves are supposed to kick into an open position to prevent pipeline overpressure and flow into tank 190. But according to the report, also lost along with the uninterrupted power supply failure were audible and visual alarms when relief valves open at 5 percent or more. The operators, according to the report, did not realize that a power failure causes the relief valves to open into tank 190. The tank then overfilled and spilled crude oil into the containment area.
The report noted that at least four serious incidents have occurred at pump station 9 since 2007, including one on March 22, 2007, that was nearly identical to the spill in May and almost caused an explosion at the facility, but the company has failed to learn from the operational mistakes that caused those accidents.
"A number of significant incidents on TAPS over the last several years, demonstrate a trend of operational discipline deficiencies similar to those at [tank 190]," the Root Cause Analysis and Post Accident Review report said.
Although Alyeska implemented recommendations from reports into past incidents, "there is recognition of a need for significant improvement in the organization's ability to effectively learn from these experiences and prevent recurrence. The previous incident actions have been completed, however, they did not result in the cultural and behavioral changes ... Reports and recommendations from previous incidents have not been communicated well throughout the organization."
A BP master root cause specialist with behavioral safety as well as business management experience reviewed the internal report into the spill and said the findings "indicate a deep and widespread problem that is likely to be reflective not just of the operating environment but also maintenance and integrity management discipline ... and highlights a clear and significant risk to the safe operation of TAPS."
The BP official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the uninterrupted power supply failure and the fact that the pump station is usually unmanned caused the operations control center located in Anchorage to lose all visibility with the facility and was unable to obtain crucial operational data about what unfolded.
"This is the inherent weakness of strategic reconfiguration: unmanned pump station," the BP official said. "This event could have been much worse if it had occurred when people were not there. Everything is dependent on no power failures, redundant power supplies to work and all equipment to set up in the right safe condition upon loss of power."
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