Health Impact Assessments for Oil and Gas

Whilst Health and Safety has always been a high priority for companies across the oil and gas industry, traditionally the focus has been primarily on the welfare of employees working within the geographical boundaries of a specific project. Although some organisations have voluntarily gone down the track of examining the impact of their activities on the welfare of surrounding communities, this has never been considered mandatory.

However, if not yet a legal requirement, expectations of responsibility are changing, amongst stakeholders in the community and amongst financial institutions and development banks, many of whom have specific requirements for the management of health issues. Oil and gas companies need to assess the public health impact of their activities on host communities to understand and address their responsibilites fully.

In January this year, IPIECA, The International Petroleum Industry Environmental Conservation Association, focussed directly on this issue with the publication of its first industry guide to Health Impact Assessments (HIA), with the intention of identifying the purpose and value of HIAs within the context of the oil and gas industry and creating a common understanding of what the basic concerns, principles and practices should be.

An HIA is the means by which a project or activity may be evaluated according to its potential effects on the health of a population, in the understanding that health can be affected by a multiplicity of factors which can also include environmental and economic issues. Basic areas of health concerns would take into account exposure to potentially hazardous materials, which could include chemicals, pesticides or solvents, but would equally recognise the respiratory effects of increased road dust. There are also issues such as the impact of a greater volume of traffic on road accidents and injuries, noise pollution or an increased incidence of sexually transmitted infections from informal overnight stops.

The HIA is an examination of both the positives and the negatives, the benefits of a potentially enhanced local district or provincial health system countered with its possible detrimental effects on the role of traditional health providers, indigenous medicines or unique cultural health practices.

Whilst there is no prescriptive approach, some companies have developed a framework for the HIA process and an example of this is presented in the IPIECA guidelines, which can be ordered direct from www.ipieca.org and are also available as a free download (PDF, 1.8MB).

For organisations who take the HIA initiative the benefits can be significant, not least allowing for improved project management and design in a cost effective manner, but also bringing some clarity to delineating roles and responsibilities between host governments, communities and a project sponsor and enhancing relationships between all stakeholders from project development through to the final decommissioning stage.