Britain's oil and gas industry has learnt significant lessons over the years from the Piper Alpha disaster and has used them to instil comprehensive health and safety training for workers in the sector.

That is the conclusion of a new report into the long-term effects of the tragedy by the industry body Oil & Gas UK.

The 1988 incident, which saw an explosion and subsequent fire kill 167 men on the offshore oil platform, prompted an in-depth government inquiry, which ultimately issued 100 safety recommendations.

Now the employer federation's director of health and safety Chris Allen has stated that the lessons learnt from Piper Alpha have drastically altered training standards within the sector, making a repetition of such a disaster highly unlikely.

"Piper Alpha was a turning point for the UK oil and gas industry, leading to significant changes in the industry's approach to safety management, regulation and training," he told an industry conference.

"This included transferring the responsibility for offshore safety to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), setting up a safety case regime, replacing existing prescriptive legislation with goal setting requirements, encouraging greater workforce involvement and making major changes to the design of offshore platforms."

According to the latest figures from the HSE, during 2006/7 there were just two fatalities within the UK oil industry in comparison to 85 in the service sector and 77 in construction, with improvements in training standards a significant reason behind this.