Partner 14: Bureau Veritas (BV)

Bureau Veritas (BV) is a service company specializing in QHSE management (quality, health & safety and environment) and social accountability, with a network that covers 140 countries and includes 550 offices and laboratories. Bureau Veritas offers an extensive range of technical services and solutions in the fields of certification, conformity assessment, consulting and training. Boasting 13,000 employees, Bureau Veritas serves more than 200,000 customers from numerous different industries across the world, from small local companies to major multinational corporations. Bureau Veritas is recognized and accredited by the world's largest national and international organizations. Combining expertise and worldwide coverage, Bureau Veritas offers integrated solutions that are capable of responding to all of its clients' specific problems. All of these services are now enhanced by a more integrated approach, which allows Bureau Veritas to tackle the most complex and strategic questions, and sometimes even the terms in which the questions are couched. The marine business sector main objective is to improve the quality of ships and shipping around the world, bringing tangible benefits to ship-owners, the people who work in shipping, and the environment through recognised quality assurance systems and certification.

Concerning the marine sector, Bureau Veritas has a wide experience in classification of ships, where classification consists in gathering technical information enabling an appreciation of the degree of confidence or class granted to the ships. To carry out their jobs, Surveyors refer to Bureau Veritas rules, which are continuously maintained and updated. To achieve this aim, Bureau Veritas performs research studies in various technical fields covering in particular risk analysis, hydrodynamics, structural reliability and software development. More than 7000 ships are classed by Bureau Veritas and are subject to periodical class and statutory surveys. In that respect, Bureau Veritas has got a large experience in problems related to the design and the construction of high-speed crafts, cruise vessels passengers ships and RoPax as well as the use of various materials for shipbuilding. The Research Department of Bureau Veritas Marine Division has been (and still is) involved in many research projects co-funded by the European Commission, either as project leader or as contributing partner.

Bureau Veritas has experience and modelling tools in safety projects dealing with fire, evacuation and abandoning. It has strongly been implicated in the successful Safety First project (FP5). Since then, BV has performed several private advanced safety studies: complete advanced evacuation analysis for a Navy builder, with the goal to reach the MSC 1033 compliance; complete Fire Engineering study performed for a civilian yard, including preliminary analysis and quantitative analysis within the use of advance simulation tools. The goal was to find design solutions for the enlargement of Main Vertical Zones that were not directly compliant with the SOLAS. In addition, BV is responsible for the assessment of the performance of existing and novel concepts of life Saving Appliances, within the Safecrafts (FP6) project.

Jon McGregor holds the position of Head of the Risk Engineering Section, within the Marine Division's Research Department. He is responsible for the development and management of Bureau Veritas’ research into human, environmental and asset risk and risk control. His main area of expertise is Risk Based Design. He has a Bachelor of Engineering, with Honours, in Naval Architecture and Master of Research in Marine Technology, which specialised in the uncertainties of scheduling. Prior to joining Bureau Veritas, Jon worked as a Research Associate at Newcastle University.

Laurent Prat is specialised in the management of industrial and natural hazards. He holds a Master Degree in Civil Engineering. He is currently working on the development of risk assessment methods with a view to strengthening BV's expertise and know-how in risk-based design and risk-based approval process. At the present time, he has a strong focus on alternative designs and arrangements for life-saving appliances onboard passenger ships. Before joining Bureau Veritas, he has also gained experience in European issues with a Master Degree in European Studies and an in-service training at the European Commission.

Antoine Breuillard is specialised in Fire Risk Analysis and Numerical Simulations of Fire and Evacuation. He holds an engineering degree. He is now responsible for conducting the analysis for the SOLAS Fire Safety - Alternative Design and Evacuation requirements for any kind of vessel and is currently working on a research project that aims at validating the use of high performance composite material onboard a 3000 PAX ship. Prior to joining BV he worked in the French building industry (at CTICM) investigating the resistance of steel structure subjected to fire.

Philippe Corrignan is a senior research engineer working in the risk engineering section of the Marine Research Department with the primary role of providing technical and managerial leadership at the project level. He holds an engineering degree in Civil/Aeronautics Engineering and a PhD on sloshing. Prior to joining BV, he has been working for 16 years in a private company providing research and consultancy services in Marine field, as engineer and then as Project manager of Industrial and European R&D projects.

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