Paul Woodason, part of Tetra Tech’s specialist offshore energy team, advises clients on safety and compliance.
In this interview, Paul discusses health and safety challenges in the offshore energy industry and provides recommendations on what clients need to be mindful of for their projects.
How has the offshore energy sector changed in the last five years?
We are seeing broader client portfolios that include a mix of renewables and conventional energy and some big shifts in the regions where development is focused. The move away from North Sea oil and gas is an example. We are also seeing exciting technological changes such as the use of ultra high-resolution 3D (UHR3D) seismic surveys that produce exceptional detail for clients investigating their sites’ geological conditions.
Today’s developers are very aware of their health, safety and environment (HSE) responsibilities. Unsafe practices and environmental impacts can cause reputational damage as well as harm, which affects their social licence to operate.
What do clients need to consider when addressing these challenges?
Safety is even more important when projects are facing additional pressure externally and internally. We believe safety is intrinsically linked to quality, so we ensure the marine assurance and vessel audit services we offer are the gold standard. For clients, having confidence in compliance, environmental and safety measures is a crucial investment.
Our clients need the right skills in the right location, often deployed at short notice, and we can support all of those needs with our international pool of experienced consultants and auditors. Clients need to consider which marine assurance accreditation is relevant to their project. We work to recognised standards such as the ICMF’s Offshore Vessel Inspection Database (OVID) and the IMCA’s Common Marine Inspection Document (CMID). OVID is particularly tightly controlled and managed and our team can initiate OVID audits for seismic contractors so that related vessel inspections can take place, when contractors cannot. Without these, vessels cannot be used for seismic survey work.
We also offer our own Operational HSE Audit, developed over the past 30 years. Our clients favour this as an addition to other inspections because the audit examines HSE management and implementation.
How does Tetra Tech support the safety compliance and operational efficiency of marine vessels?
Our consultants are experienced in both operations management and experts in the field of maritime health and safety, sharing our commitment. All of our consultants are ex-captains or chiefs with experience of the vessel types they are auditing. Their seniority means they can speak with vessel captains on their level.
Along with offering worldwide coverage and highly relevant experience, we also provide 24-hour, on-call office support for help with logistics and technical queries.
Where do you see most difference between oil and gas and renewables projects?
The two sectors consider different accreditations as their industry standard for marine assurance. OVID was formulated by the oil and gas industry, but in renewables, the CMID format is often preferred.
Oil and gas projects are highly regulated, but renewables projects can face greater external scrutiny. New renewables clients sometimes expect very different HSE practices and express concern about facing excessive caution or over-inspection. What we deliver is a level of safety and quality that applies in any offshore situation, while helping the client meet the relevant standards for each project.
How does your team support clients with the technological advances in offshore surveying?
Our experience as cross-industry maritime advisors has proved very valuable as technology evolves. For example, we supported the trial of a lean-crewed vessel embracing significant remote-controlled operational aspects, including launch and recovery, at the end of 2025.
Seismic surveys have traditionally towed cables many metres long while firing sound, but ocean bottom node (OBN) surveys use remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) to place nodes directly onto the seabed. This comes with a new set of HSE considerations, such as deploying and recovering lithium batteries. We have broad experience working on OBN projects, and as part of the wider Tetra Tech family, we have access to numerous technical specialists in other fields, who work closely with our wider Seismic Acquisition, Data Management and Operations, and Site Investigation and Site Operations units.
About the expert
Paul Woodason
Paul Woodason is a health, safety, and environment (HSE) operations director in Tetra Tech’s specialist offshore energy business.
With more than 40 years of experience, Paul manages our HSE operations and marine assurance group, overseeing more than 100 associate consultants. He has developed our services to include marine assurance, emergency response services, and our core provision of HSE management for land and marine seismic surveys and offshore renewables projects.
Paul has a degree in applied physics and spent 20 years working offshore as observer and party chief for SSL and WesternGeco, managing marine seismic surveys in the U.S., West Africa, Europe and Southeast Asia.