Abstract

Risk can involve very different concepts depending on the individuals or organizations involved. The topic of risk varies widely with perceptions. Besides human health and ecological risks associated with exposures to hydrocarbons, risk can and often does involve public perception, finances, materialistic resources, socioeconomics, cultures, regulatory compliance, and politics. All of these topics have their own unique flavor of risk when dealing with environmental contamination. Petroleum industry professionals faced with mitigating risks associated with hydrocarbon contamination must fully understand how the various types of risk will impact their current and future operations. This is the art of environmental risk management.

Every type of risk can be categorized as immediate, future, or both. With few exceptions, all types of risk involve probabilities for loss of financial and materialistic resources. Developing a process by which such financial and materialistic losses are kept to a minimum while continuing to gain ground towards a goal (or a profit) is the ultimate objective of the risk manager. By using the tools of clear communication, early level negotiations with regulatory authorities and public stakeholders, land use precedents, and timely efficient investigations, much of the risk associated with hydrocarbon-contaminated sites can be controlled. This can be accomplished without extensive use of decision analysis tools and costly detailed environmental risk assessments.