Decommissioning, Safety and Africa’s Blue Energy Economy: An Analysis of the African Integrated Maritime Strategy (Aims) 2050

The African maritime region is home to a variety of natural resources, including oil and gas and has significant potential for the maximisation of emerging offshore energy resources like wind, tidal and hydrogen. While thse discussions on the economic exploitation of these resources and the environmental dimensions of decommissioning have been the focus of numerous studies,¹ the analysis of the legal and regulatory regime for safe decommissioning these assets and installations are quite limited. Considering that safety is an important consideration in the decommissioning of offshore oil and gas installations, this article takes a particularly unique position in critically examining the safety implications of offshore decommissioning of oil and gas infrastructures and the regulatory regime that is required to mitigate these safety risks. From an African context, it argues that the regulatory architecture for ensuring the safe removal of these offshore assets have not been give the required attention. More specifically, the decommissioning regime under the various African Conventions and particularly the African Integrated Maritime Strategy (AIMS) 2050, does not provide for a safety risk governance model as well as the various measures of regulatory scrutiny that ensures compliance in such a high and major risk operation. Drawing lessons from the European Safety Directive 2013 that was adopted following the 2010 Macondo disaster,² this article argues for the adoption of a safety case-like regulatory strategy that requires members states to promote the adoption of a Mazard report.