The ongoing developments in safety and reliability remains a primary focus for the oil and gas industry. Greater effort is now being put into assessing the safety and reliability of complex engineering systems, and of ensuring that existing facilities can continue to be operated safely and economically.
MSc Safety and Reliability Engineering for Oil and Gas is also available to study part time online.
This programme is studied on campus.
This programme provides advanced education and training for graduate engineers in the area of safety engineering, reliability engineering, and loss prevention. There is a continuing demand for individuals with specialist knowledge in these areas, partly a result of the legal requirements to assess and control industrial risks to people and the environment and partly because of the need to create high integrity engineering systems in many industries.
Safety engineering is not a subject which is adequately covered in most undergraduate degrees, so this MSc programme brings together those topics relating to the safety and reliability of engineering products and systems, including the legislative framework, in a unified approach.
The MSc Safety and Reliability Engineering for Oil and Gas provides an integrated approach to safety and reliability issues across most of the traditional branches of engineering, and will allow you to specialise in offshore engineering, technical safety, reliability, legislations and regulations or human factors. You will be taught by staff from the School of Engineering, Institute of Mathematics, School of Psychology and the Department of Environmental and Occupational Medicine. In addition to the above, a number of lectures are given by industrially-based practising safety and reliability specialists.
Campus study is fully accredited by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE), the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE), the Institute of Highway Engineers (IHE) and the Chartered Institution of Highways & Transportation (CIHT).
The course serves as the entrance to the field of safety and reliability engineering with the introduction of the basic concepts and tools of safety and risk management. Legal frames related to engineering safety are also introduced.
Contents include: Fundamentals of safety engineering; natural and man-made hazards; safety measures; accident and failure statistics; fundamentals of risk management; risk assessment techniques; classical reliability theory; modelling of engineering systems as series and parallel systems; redundancy; fault trees and event trees; availability and maintainability; UK safety legislation, including the Health and Safety at Work Act and its historical, offshore and other regulations.
The aim of this course is to get an understanding of applied probability and statistics. Students will be able to handle variables of a random nature, deal with parameters of different distributions and data of scattering nature.
Hydrocarbon fires and explosions produce extreme loading on engineering components. Structural steels lose their strength and stiffness well below the temperatures associated with hydrocarbon fires. Safety-critical elements must be designed to withstand both these temperatures and the blast overpressures that result from hydrocarbon explosions. Simple models are used to assess the loading that results from fires and explosions. Structural elements are analysed to illustrate the design procedures that are required to prevent escalation and to design against major accident scenarios.
This course will equip students with the required knowledge of offshore and subsea oil and gas production systems, and to enable them to gain an appreciation of the infrastructure and facilities that need to be removed during decommissioning.
The aim of this course is to understand and be able to carry out probabilistic modelling of uncertainty in engineering components and systems. Students will be able to obtain a good knowledge and understanding on random variables in probabilistic analysis and be able to carry out approximation and numerical schemes on components and systems.
Risk assessment, the common tools used for (and the legal requirement associated with) risk assessment are covered. Students will have a thorough understanding on the components of good assessment and management of risks, and be familiar with the basic requirement for HAZID, HAZOP, SIL, QRA and the Safety Case.
Candidates will develop PIDs for major systems applying LOPA and including instrumentation. Inherently safe equipment layout principles for both onshore and offshore applications are addressed. Layouts will be developed for example applications.
The safety critical systems are reviewed and discussed.
Corrosion mechanisms are addressed together with materials for construction properties. Basic corrosion models are presented for a wide range of fluids. The operational modes which present most demand on materials are reviewed. Corrosion in erosive environments is addressed. Effects of temperature deviations in fire & blowdown are illustrated and analysed. Case studies are used to illustrate common issues.
Human Factors Engineering (HFE) relates to how people interact with engineering systems. Failures in these areas are involved in all major incidents. Candidates explore them as part of this course. First, a review of major accidents will be undertaken to identify how equipment design, individual behaviours, and organisational behaviours contributed. Equipment/system design and the effect it has on individuals’ behaviours is explored. Human Error is addressed. Finally, organisational behaviours will be examined. Leading and Lagging indicators are explored and their strengths/weaknesses considered. Candidates have the opportunity to complete practical assessments led by industry practitioners with specialist expertise in HFE.
Full-time students will be required to undertake a project commencing in June, submitting their work in September. Students will, where possible, undertake this while on an industrial placement. The subject for a student’s dissertation will be chosen following discussion between staff and the student and in the light of placement availability. Part-time students will carry out a project during their final year of study.
Students may have opportunity to carry out the project as part of an industrial placement. The dissertation is an independent piece of work based on a topic of students’ own choice. The students are encouraged to focus their dissertation on a problem confronting the Safety industry, and to demonstrate how the fundamentals they have learned during the taught programme can be put into practice. The dissertation should contain a degree of original work and demonstrate in-depth the skills and knowledge acquired throughout the MSc programme.
We will endeavour to make all course options available; however, these may be subject to timetabling and other constraints. Please see our InfoHub pages for further information.
Communication and self-learning skills are enhanced through a series of tutorials, coursework, technical reports and presentations. Coursework involving group projects are designed to develop creativity, leadership and team-building skills and to encourage initiative and personal responsibility in the implementation of the projects.
The information below is provided as a guide only and does not guarantee entry to the University of Aberdeen.
Please enter your country to view country-specific entry requirements.
To study for a Postgraduate Taught degree at the University of Aberdeen it is essential that you can speak, understand, read, and write English fluently. The minimum requirements for this degree are as follows:
IELTS Academic:
OVERALL - 6.5 with: Listening - 5.5; Reading - 5.5; Speaking - 5.5; Writing - 6.0
TOEFL iBT:
OVERALL - 90 with: Listening - 17; Reading - 18; Speaking - 20; Writing - 21
PTE Academic:
OVERALL - 62 with: Listening - 51; Reading - 51; Speaking - 51; Writing - 54
Cambridge English Advanced & Proficiency:
OVERALL - 176 with: Listening - 162; Reading - 162; Speaking - 162; Writing - 169
Read more about specific English Language requirements here.
You will be required to supply the following documentation with your application as proof you meet the entry requirements of this degree programme. If you have not yet completed your current programme of study, then you can still apply and you can provide your Degree Certificate at a later date.
You will be classified as one of the fee categories below.
| Fee category | Cost |
|---|---|
| Home / EU / RUK Students | £5,500 |
| Tuition Fees for 2018/19 Academic Year | |
| International Students | £20,000 |
| Tuition Fees for 2018/19 Academic Year |
Further Information about tuition fees and the cost of living in Aberdeen
OPITO, the skills organisation for oil and gas, is offering two scholarships worth £6,000 each to students commencing a Master’s degree in safety engineering at the University of Aberdeen. Further information on eligibility criteria and how to apply can be found on the Funding Database.
The SFC Postgraduate tuition fee scholarship may be available for those classified as Home/EU fee status students for this programe. Visit the scholarship page for more information.
View all funding options in our Funding Database.
Safety will always remain a vital part of the industry. Those with the right level of engineering skills will always be in demand.
You will be taught by a range of experts including professors, lecturers, teaching fellows and postgraduate tutors. Staff changes will occur from time to time; please see our InfoHub pages for further information.
Conducting world-class research in the general area of safety & reliabiltiy engineering at the University. To develop the industry focus of safety & reliability engineering research and facilitate the transfer knowledge.
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