Risk-Based Approval
4.4 How Do Risk-Based Design and the Associated Approval Work Together?
board operational experience. The new building crew is usually involved with a project from a relatively early stage, and ideally, their knowledge of the vessel in- creases through the construction phase. The crew retains and handles the on board documentation, and wherever special requirements to maintenance, manoeuvring, reporting or supervising become relevant, the crew should be aware of the features and the decision making basis arising from the risk based approaches applied.
Qualification requirements are of course pertinent to all parties involved in the process, as this is the only way to ensure a sound decision making basis. However the map also shows where it is necessary to ensure or even enhance qualifications, because the specific stakeholder has a crucial role in the design process, e.g. owner, Approval Authority, Recognized Organizations – and the crew. The latter is maybe not that obvious.
When first identified, it is much easier to focus adjustments to qualifications.
However all parties need a familiarization process, to a level of knowledge in accor- dance with their type of involvement in the risk based design.
As seen from the qualification maps some stakeholders will necessarily have a highly intense level of involvement with a risk based design, throughout the life cycle of the project. Given the concerns on recruitment in the maritime industry, fi- nancial resources and career options within an organisation are primary motivational factors for attracting qualified candidates for open positions. Some of the stakehold- ers mentioned necessarily have greater potential for attracting qualified candidates.
Due to organisational size and resources, owners, recognized organisations, con- sultants and to some extent designers and yards have relatively high recruitment potential, should they require expertise that they do not possess, while other stake- holders may have to upgrade existing personnel due to limited recruitment poten- tial (limited size or limited financial flexibility, for instance with public authorities, crewing agencies, universities/research institutes - the trend can be confirmed by comparing the number of qualified applicants for maritime technical position with the respective stakeholders).
4.4 How Do Risk-Based Design and the Associated
obvious question for future risk-based design is how much effort is needed upfront to explore the design solution space before preliminary approval from an approval authority.
New activities within risk-based design and approval processes have to be aligned with existing schedules for owners, yards and suppliers. Ideally, a yard seeks to build-up complete knowledge of the expected risk analysis and its results before the contract with the owner is signed. This means that significant amount of analysis may have to be carried out prior to application for preliminary approval and before the detailed approval requirements are issued. On the other hand, investing too much before an indication of feasibility is not advisable.
Key milestones in the combined schedule are presented in the figure below, show- ing on the left yards’ activities, in the centre the owners’ actions and to the right the approval authorities’ steps. It is emphasized that the shown alignment may vary according to the actual case.
The depicted alignment of schedules indicates that after signature of the letter of intent, the yard commences the production of a full design concept which is then previewed with the approval authority to decide whether a risk-based approval is needed or not. If needed, the qualitative phase of the design and approval is entered which concludes with the preliminary approval by the approval authority. Once the conditions attached to the preliminary approval are known – and are acceptable – the yard approaches the owner to sign the contract. Following this key milestone, a quantitative analysis is started which – together with the traditional design activities in this stage – eventually result in an approved design (Fig. 4.10).
Partners of SAFEDOR have intensively debated the above schedule. In particular, the discussion centered on how much effort by the yard or designer is spent before the letter of intent. For truly challenging and large projects, the quantitative part of the risk assessment is most likely carried out before the letter of intent and, therefore, well before the preliminary approval.
The main reason is that yards do not want the process to be interrupted by the relatively late preliminary approval. Yards ideally seek to have all issues affecting the design and approval process solved before applying for approval.
It is noted in this context that one objective of risk based design is to increase the knowledge about the ship design in the early design phase and, therefore, facilitate decision making. Thus, with advanced tools available, a risk analysis on key as- pects can be performed cost-effectively before a letter of intent is signed. Note that this early design activity was presented in the introduction as a risk-based design optimisation.
Taking into account the above discussion, the alignment of owner and regula- tory processes is more or less fixed. The alignment of the design process can vary depending on the level of challenge.
In the shown schedule, the design concept is established before the signing of the letter of intent. More importantly, the design concept is enhanced by a preliminary risk assessment involving preliminary HazId, qualitative risk ranking, risk analysis and evaluations of risk control options.
Fig. 4.10 Overview of key steps for “normal” projects
The yard thus establishes a clearer picture on the feasibility of the concept prior to signature of the letter of intent. Obviously, following the design preview with the approval authority, only updates of the supplied documentation (HazId, qualitative risk ranking, risk models, risk analysis and evaluations of risk control options) is expected to be required.
It is unlikely that any ship will be entirely risk-based in the near future.
The reason is that prescriptive rules offer a far more competitive approval basis than a risk-based approach for many standard elements of a ship. Therefore, risk- based approaches will only be applied in selected area of ship design.
Today we already see many ship designs with alternative arrangements related to fire safety following SOLAS-II.2/17. Here, risk-based approval comprises a chal- lenge related to a single design aspect. The overwhelming part of the ship design is prescriptive (not risk-based) and the traditional design and approval process are pursued as before.
For the rule challenge, safety equivalence is demonstrated, and if the safety equivalence fails (for whatever reasons), the vessel is likely to be approved and built with another solution in compliance with existing rules. For ship designs adopting this partial risk-based approval case, a schedule as presented in figure above is applicable.
Fig. 4.11 Overview of key steps in risk-based design and risk-based approval
In the future, however, a complex case of risk-based approval comprising sev- eral rule challenges could be anticipated. The major portion of the ship design is prescriptive (not risk-based). However, if the safety equivalence fails, the project could probably not be realised. For ship designs in correspondence with this case, a schedule as presented in Fig. 4.11 seems more applicable.