ABSTRACT
This chapter starts with a couple of observations that have to do with the fact that fossil fuels by far are the most important source of energy on which the societies depend. The production of energy in quantities sufficient to sustain a society at its current level of complexity is intimately linked with, or better, framed by and entrained in global flow of capital, the trading of financial interests and management of financial risks. Issues of technical integrity and operational reliability of offshore installations are partially divorced from the management of a company's financial interests. The chapter defines vulnerability as 'a reduced ability to anticipate, resist, cope with or recover from "events" that threaten the achievement or maintenance of performative closure'. Performative closure is shorthand for the achievement and/or maintenance of core task completion while maintaining functional system integrity. The chapter starts with the observation that the complex and advanced societies exist and live far from thermo-dynamic equilibrium.
