17 February 2011 London Evening Meeting
Chairman Dr Bob Allwood, Chief Executive, SUT
Sponsored by Douglas-Westwood
Douglas-Westwood presented their latest annual ‘Global Offshore Prospects’ outlook. Director Steve Robertson and Senior Analyst Thom Payne examined the macroeconomic outlook for 2011 and beyond and presented the firm’s latest forecasts for activity and expenditure within the subsea and associated offshore sectors and technologies.
16 February 2011 Aberdeen Branch Evening Meeting
Chairmain David Kaye, Aquamarine Power
Sponsored by Aerospace & Marine International, Amarcon and StormGeo
Meteorological conditions have a huge impact on the offshore industry, through all of the design, construction, operation and decommissioning phases of an offshore development. This evening meeting looked at some of the key principles of offshore meteorology, including extreme weather forecasting for design and short-term forecasting for construction and operations, the new meteorological issues facing the emerging renewable industry and the topical issue of climate change. The meeting closed with a presentation and demonstration of weather monitoring and decision support system to optimise offshore operations.
Forecasting for Design and Operations
Keith Thomson, Aerospace & Marine International (AMI)
For offshore operations the presentation gave a brief outline of weather forecast providers and their relationship to users of the forecasts, before explaining how global numerical models operate and how they are initialised with observational data. For design criteria an explanation of how observations of wave height are averaged and processed was given.
Meteorology for Renewables
Hilde Holdhus and Alan Binley, StormGeo
The presentation focused on meteorology for the offshore renewables industry. Accurate meteorological data and forecasting is essential to determine the optimum location of renewable devices and the expected revenue. Renewable devices are generally located in the inshore region with different meteorological characteristics and less operational experience than the more conventional offshore industry locations. This presentation addressed the key aspects of meteorology for renewables, including offshore wind and marine renewable sectors.
Climate Change, Variability and Data Trends
Ian Leggett, OceanExpert Ltd
Climate change continues to be a source of public debate. The principles are well known, however the impact on the offshore industry is less understood, even within the industry itself. This presentation addressed temperature changes through time, key concerns and impacts of climate change, trends/changes, science and perception and natural variability, and trends in North Sea wave heights.
Monitoring and Decision Support System for Weather-Sensitive Operations
Leon Adegeest, Amarcon
Once you have the weather forecast available, what will be the impact of the weather on the vessel? And how can you optimise the performance in the expected weather?
26 January 2011 North of England Branch Evening Meeting
Chairman Ian Frazer, GL Noble Denton
Sponsored by GL Noble Denton
The very term ‘Design Life’ predicts a precipice at some future date against which all engineering and financial calculations are derived – and yet what shall actually be involved in removing the structures, that were often a feat of ingenuity to install in the first place, is all too frequently considered as a distant problem. Decommissioning, however, is already taking place and increasing in volume. There is disquiet within the oil and gas industry which has been caught largely unprepared for the challenge, let alone the opportunity.
The SUT’s newly formed Salvage and Decommissioning Committee and its interactive Special Interest Group were established in February 2010 to help address this situation, by bringing together the offshore, marine salvage and scientific sectors in order to exchange technologies, methodologies, ideas and information.
This evening meeting began with a brief overview of aims of the Committee and the means by which it intends stimulate activity, before highlighting specific aspects of practical work.
Global Decommissioning Opportunities
Brian Twomey, Managing Director, Reverse Engineering Limited
Brian gave a global market overview which contained a summary of the structures to be decommissioned and an estimate of market value and timing.
Synergies between Decommissioning, Wreck Removal and Cargo Recovery
Moya Crawford, Managing Director, Deep Tek Ltd
The international salvage community forms a responsive, risk-based industry that removes structures and recovers property from the seabed as part of its everyday work, using a wide range of equipment, cutting and lifting techniques. The presentation discussed the synergies and highlighted some of the applications.
Overview of North Sea Decommissioning Campaigns
Don Orr, Principal Engineer, GL Noble Denton
A substantial number of offshore facilities have now been removed from the North Sea. The presentation explored the variety of structures decommissioned and the range of techniques employed. This was demonstrated using experience from 3 decommissioning campaigns supported by GL Noble Denton over the last 3 years.
20 January 2011 London Evening Meeting
Chairman Dr Bob Allwood, Chief Executive, SUT
Sponsored by Subsea Communities and supported by Acteon
HPHT fields and projects pose unique operating challenges that we believe the industry can overcome together. To address this, Acteon is building an industrial community where knowledge and experience can be shared for the benefit of all involved. This evening’s meeting is hosted by Will Rowley, Acteon Group, Analyst responsible for the Acteon Subsea Communities. The evening’s speakers presented information on HPHT (Seabed to Surface) that would typically be presented at a Community Event.
HPHT Trends, Definitions and Issues
Will Rowley, Group Analyst, Acteon
Drawing on recently correlated data, this presentation provided an overview of current trends and influences in regards to HPHT projects and field developments. It also introduced the Acteon led HPHT (Seabed to Surface) Industrial Community, highlighting the aims and benefits of working together to overcome the challenges that the industry will face in the future.
HPHT Subsea Design
John McGrail, Director, 2H Offshore
As a global engineering contractor that specialises in the design and structural analysis of risers and conductor systems, 2H has direct experience of the key challenges of designing subsea equipment for HPHT service. John identified and discussed the difficulties faced in the design of riser and flowline systems for HPHT conditions, highlighting the technologies and step changes required for future progress.
Riser Systems and Connection Options
Rick Moralee, Sales Manager, Claxton Engineering
Holding one of the largest jack-up drilling riser stocks in Europe, Claxton is at the forefront of HPHT riser system operation and deployment. This presentation provided an overview of HP drilling riser systems with particular attention to connection options and the associated operational advantages.
19 January 2011 Aberdeen Branch Lunch Seminar
Chairman Alistair Birnie, CEO, Subsea UK
Sponsored by Infield and Quest Offshore
Over the past two years there has been significant fluctuations in the global energy market, caused by the financial situation/global recession, which in turn has affected energy prices.
However 2011 would appear to be the turning point and this evening meeting’s presentations reviewed the opinions of two major market analysts and their viewpoint for 2011 and beyond. This included a debate on the impact to the UK’s subsea industry but more importantly the overall global market.
Kader Dicko, Analyst, Infield
As the oil and gas industry is slowly recovering from the global financial crisis and the Macondo disaster, albeit with a looming fear of a double dip recession due to the European sovereign debt crisis, the global subsea and offshore construction market shows some promising signs of revival in the near future. Strengthening oil prices and rising tendering activities for subsea production systems and offshore construction activities will eventually improve the market in the medium term on the back of higher project sanctioning. Whilst contract awards in the North Sea have been slow to pick up in 2010, we expect a more buoyant level of activity from late 2011/early 2012. The aim of this presentation was to illustrate the current state and medium term outlook of the subsea and offshore construction market on a global scope.
Caitlin Shaw, Director Market Research & Data Division, Quest
Quest Offshore, a leading provider for deepwater market intelligence, focused this presentation on the future of the global subsea market. The subsea market has been truly dynamic in the past few years as the industry adjusts to a number of global events, but with growing confidence in the future, activity is expected to regain significant momentum. THe presentation explained to attendees where the market has come from in recent years and how that will change in the future and the drivers behind those changes.
17 March 2011 London Evening Meeting
Chairman Dr Bob Allwood, Chief Executive, SUT
Sponsored by Flexlife
In early January 2011, the 14" flowline between Forties Bravo (FB) and Forties Charlie (FC) platforms developed a leak in the vicinity of the FC platform. Several repairs were undertaken, however, new leaks occurred in the line at each pressure test after repairs. It was decided to cut out and remove a 10m section of the line for further examination and analysis to determine the cause of its failure. On removing this section, a Smart flanged section was put in its place. Unfortunately during the pressure test new failures were identified and it was therefore decided to retire the line altogether.
In order to mitigate both valuable production and associated financial losses, a decision was taken to provide a temporary connection between FB and FC, by re-routing the currently existing 8” produced water flexible injection line (PWRI) also running between FB and FC, which allowed for re-instatement of hydrocarbon transport. This work was extremely fast track and production was restored by using this measure on 6th March 2011.
A number of options were considered for the permanent line replacement. It was concluded that the temporary connection will be replaced by a permanent, trenched and buried 14” flexible pipeline, the design of which has already been approved; its fabrication and installation to be executed over the next 4 to 6 months.
Apache Forties – Bravo to Charlie Pipeline Replacement Project and Interim Production through PWRI
The evening’s presentation was split into two portions. The first section presents the interim findings of the materials and corrosion examination and analysis including photographic evidence showing the failure modes in the line. This was presented by David Newman, Flexlife Asset Integrity Manager.
Following on from this, a presentation detailing the subsea campaigns since early January 2011 culminating in the novel rerouting of the produced water line (PWRI) and its connection into the Bravo – Charlie system was given by Paul Williams who is a Project Manager with Flexlife and was directly responsible for these works.
9 March 2011 Aberdeen Branch Evening Meeting
Chairman Adrian Phillips
Excitement continues to grow around the prospects of major exploration and development in and around the arctic continental shelf. Russian gas giant Gazprom is voicing optimism about the prospects for a final investment decision this year in favour of the landmark Shtokman gas and liquefied natural gas development in the Barents Sea. The Shtokman offshore field is a joint project controlled by Gazprom with France’s Total and Norway’s Statoil as minority shareholders. The other major Russian player Rosneft is already talking to "global players" about exploration ventures in Russia’s Barents Sea and the Asian part of Russia’s Arctic waters. This follows major joint ventures signed last month to explore in the Arctic’s South Kara Sea with BP and in the Black Sea with ExxonMobil.
Subsea Arctic Pipelines: Key to Successful Field Developments
Glenn Lanan, Intecsea
Hydrocarbon transportation is one of the controlling requirements for offshore Arctic field development and pipelines are often required for intrafield flowlines, export to shore-based facilities or for tanker loading systems. The offshore Arctic environmental and loading conditions provide unique challenges for conventional subsea pipeline technology. INTECSEA summarised the increasing industry experience with pipeline design, construction and operation in ice covered waters and highlighted some of the remaining challenges such as optimised design for ice loadings and subsea leak detection.
Richard Carter, Aker Solutions
Following Statoil’s pioneering and record breaking subsea project, Snohvit, the next major subsea development in the same area is ENI’s Goliat. Statoil opted for a 140km "long offset", whilst ENI have chosen for an FPSO. Aker Solutions provided some insights on the reason for the decision whilst offering a perspective on the engineering challenges of the subsea solution.
Recent Advances in Satellite Remote Sensing for Ice Monitoring
Nicholas Walker, eOsphere
Satellite remote sensing can provide useful information for operators working in ice infested waters, including information about ice extent, ice type, ice motion and icebergs. Recent advances in satellite SAR technology allow additional information to be extracted for successful ice monitoring. These new capabilities include improved resolutions, improved polarimetric and radar frequency options.
