G9: 616 Reported Incidents in Offshore Wind Industry in 2013

The G9 Offshore Wind Health and Safety Association (G9), supported by the Energy Institute (EI), has published its first annual incident data report.

This publication gives a comprehensive insight into the health and safety performance of the G9 members from 35 sites spread across the United Kingdom and Northern Europe.

The offshore wind industry has seen impressive growth in recent years as demand for low carbon electricity increases. Working in an offshore environment means that health and safety has to be a priority and there is an expectation that the industry will demonstrate, and improve, its health and safety performance.

Benj Sykes, Chairman, G9 Board of Directors, and UK Country Manager, DONG Energy Wind Power, says: “Within the G9 member companies, health and safety is of utmost importance. The publication of this report is pivotal and the first step to laying a foundation in which we can begin to measure, manage and continuously improve our health and safety performance more effectively.”

Since its formation in 2010, the G9 has been collecting HSE information and statistics from its members for analysis: the publication of this report fulfils a G9 objective to be transparent and to reduce HSE risks in the offshore wind industry. Through the EI, the G9 are committed to publishing incident data reports on an annual basis in order to identify trends, areas of improvement and to allow for benchmarking performance against other industries.

This report highlights that there were 616 reported incidents in 2013 with the following consequences:

• 66 lost work days
• 12 restricted work days
• 30 medical treatment injuries
• 61 first aid incidents
• 345 near hits
• 102 hazards

The G9 went into partnership with the EI in 2013 to develop good practice guidelines which will improve health and safety performance in the offshore wind industry. The incident data has been essential in informing the development of these guidelines, which G9 will be publishing later in 2014.