Environmental Management in Oil and Gas Operations Training Course

Course overview

Oil and gas operations face environmental exposure at every stage: seismic work, drilling, production, processing, pipelines, terminals, decommissioning and contractor activity. Environmental managers must translate permit conditions, corporate standards and regulatory obligations into controls that work at site level. Failures in spill prevention, produced-water management, methane measurement, waste handling or biodiversity protection can trigger enforcement action, production disruption, remediation costs and loss of stakeholder confidence.

This five-day course equips participants to build and operate an environmental management system for upstream, midstream and downstream assets. Participants work with ISO 14001 principles, aspect-and-impact registers, legal compliance matrices, emissions inventories, spill-risk controls, waste tracking and environmental monitoring plans. They learn how to assess significant environmental aspects, set measurable objectives, investigate non-conformities, manage contractors, prepare for inspections and report credible performance data to leadership and regulators.

Instruction combines targeted technical sessions with oil and gas cases involving a drilling campaign, a produced-water release, methane reporting gaps and a pipeline right-of-way issue. Participants use templates and structured decision tools to develop an asset-level Environmental Management Action Plan, including a prioritised aspect register, compliance obligations, controls, monitoring indicators, responsibilities and corrective actions. This practical deliverable can be adapted for use at their own facility, project or operating area.

The course is designed for HSE and environmental professionals who already work around oil and gas operations and need stronger management-system, assurance and environmental-risk capability. It also gives operations, engineering and project personnel a disciplined way to incorporate environmental requirements into daily operational decisions.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Construct an ISO 14001-aligned environmental aspect and impact register for an oil and gas asset
• Evaluate permit conditions and legal obligations using a site compliance matrix
• Develop operational controls for spills, produced water, drilling waste, air emissions and hazardous materials
• Calculate and quality-check a facility greenhouse-gas inventory using methane source data and ISO 14064-1 principles
• Design an environmental monitoring plan with sampling locations, parameters, frequency, thresholds and escalation actions
• Apply root-cause analysis and corrective-action tracking to an environmental incident or audit non-conformity
• Audit contractor environmental controls against work-scope risks and defined performance requirements
• Produce a prioritised Environmental Management Action Plan with objectives, owners, deadlines and performance indicators

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Environmental Managers — who must maintain compliant, auditable environmental systems across operating assets
• HSE Managers and Advisors — who integrate environmental risks with wider operational assurance and incident management
• Oil and Gas Operations Managers — who need practical controls that protect production while meeting permit obligations
• Project and Facilities Engineers — who must embed environmental requirements into design, modification and commissioning work
• Drilling, Completion and Well Intervention Supervisors — who manage high-risk waste, chemical, discharge and spill-prevention activities
• Regulatory Compliance and Sustainability Specialists — who compile defensible environmental, emissions and performance disclosures

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have working experience in an oil and gas operating environment, project team or HSE function. They should understand basic operational terms such as produced water, flare, permit, hazardous waste, spill response and contractor management, and be able to interpret simple procedures, registers and monitoring data. Familiarity with site inspections, incident reporting or environmental legislation is useful but not essential. Participants should bring a laptop capable of opening spreadsheets and PDF documents. Prior ISO 14001 auditor certification, emissions-accounting expertise, ArcGIS experience or advanced chemistry knowledge is not required.

Training methodology

The instructor uses short technical briefings to establish the regulatory, operational and management-system context, followed by facilitated application to realistic oil and gas asset scenarios. Participants analyse permits, emissions data, waste manifests, inspection findings and incident records in small groups. Workshops use an aspect register, compliance matrix, monitoring-plan template and corrective-action log to turn issues into operational controls. Daily case outputs are reviewed against peer and instructor feedback. On the final day, each participant consolidates the work into an Environmental Management Action Plan for transfer to their own asset or function.

Course outline

Day 1: Environmental management foundations for oil and gas assets

• Environmental risk profile across upstream, midstream and downstream operations
• ISO 14001:2015 environmental management system structure and process interactions
• Lifecycle perspective from exploration and drilling through decommissioning
• Environmental aspects, impacts, receptors and pathways
• Significance scoring using consequence, likelihood, control effectiveness and stakeholder sensitivity
• Legal registers, permit conditions and corporate environmental commitments
• Roles, accountability and environmental governance for operators and contractors

Workshop: Participants build and rank an aspect-and-impact register for a fictional onshore production facility.

Day 2: Operational controls for water, waste, chemicals and spills

• Produced-water characterisation, treatment, discharge and reinjection controls
• Drilling fluids, cuttings and completion-waste management decisions
• Hazardous-waste segregation, manifesting, storage and disposal-chain verification
• Chemical inventory control, Safety Data Sheet use and secondary containment
• Spill prevention planning using source-pathway-receptor analysis
• Oil spill preparedness, notification thresholds and environmental sensitivity mapping
• Land disturbance, erosion, sediment and biodiversity protection measures

Workshop: Teams review a produced-water release scenario and produce a control plan, notification decision and corrective-action log.

Day 3: Air emissions, methane and environmental monitoring

• Emission sources from combustion, flaring, venting, fugitives and loading operations
• Methane measurement, estimation and reconciliation methods under OGMP 2.0
• ISO 14064-1 inventory boundaries, activity data and data-quality checks
• Flare efficiency, venting authorisation and leak detection and repair programmes
• Ambient air, groundwater, surface-water, soil and noise monitoring design
• Sampling plans, chain of custody, laboratory quality assurance and data validation
• Environmental performance indicators, thresholds, trend analysis and management reporting

Workshop: Participants create a methane data-quality improvement plan and a monitoring schedule for a gas-processing facility.

Day 4: Assurance, incident learning and contractor control

• Environmental inspection planning and evidence-based field verification
• Internal audit criteria, interview methods and audit-trail sampling
• Environmental non-conformity classification and risk-based escalation
• Root-cause analysis using five whys, barrier analysis and causal-factor mapping
• Corrective and preventive action registers with effectiveness verification
• Contractor prequalification, environmental clauses and mobilisation checks
• Management of change for new chemicals, process modifications and operating envelopes

Workshop: Participants conduct a desk-based environmental audit of a contractor work package and issue findings with corrective actions.

Day 5: Implementation planning and management review

• Setting environmental objectives, targets and leading performance indicators
• Risk-based prioritisation of environmental improvement actions
• Environmental budget justification using risk, compliance and operating-value evidence
• Stakeholder engagement with regulators, communities and joint-venture partners
• Environmental reporting controls and traceable management-review inputs
• Integration of environmental requirements into asset integrity and operational-excellence systems
• Ninety-day implementation planning and accountability mapping

Workshop: Participants assemble and present an asset-level Environmental Management Action Plan with priorities, owners, milestones and assurance measures.

Tools & standards covered

ISO 14001:2015, ISO 14064-1:2018, OGMP 2.0 Reporting Framework, ArcGIS Pro

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions