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Subsea Equipment Past, Present and Future
SUT/MASTS WorkshopDecommissioning and Wreck Removal
Glasgow 1st/2nd October 2015
The beginning
• First subsea completions – Lake Erie 1943, GoM 1961• Typical North Sea system of early 1970’s comprised:
– Xmas trees and well heads– Templates/Manifolds
• Gravity structures• Pin/Suction Piled structures
– Pipelines/PLEMs/Jumpers/Umbilicals
• Experimental subsea separation and pumping - 1980’s• Specs and Codes extensions of land based API codes but
many major oilcos used own “experienced based” standards
• Little thought for decommissioning/removal
Where are we now?
• More reliance on subsea production as reservoirs get smaller and more remote
• Move to deeper water means more subsea• API supplemented by equivalent ISO codes• First HPHT (10k-15k) developments• First steps in large scale subsea processing• Early field abandonment and equipment removal• Push to re-utilise ageing infrastucture, particularly
pipelines, in mature areas
Manifold & Support Structure 175 Tonne
Manifold Suction Pile 130 Tonne
Flowline Termination Assembly & Mudmat110 Tonne
Injection Tree 50 Tonne
Production Tree 55 Tonne
Wellhead & Guide Base 16 Tonne
Flowline Connection3 Tonne
Today’s Equipment
c.70,000 tonnes on the Seabed!
What have we learnt?
• Development of material technologies, particularly:– Forging– Welding exotic materials– Corrosion management
• Equipment performance– Equipment reliability and qualification testing– Systems and equipment testing– Integrity monitoring/diagnostic testing– Predictive maintenance
• Remote intervention technologies• Importance of systems engineering
– Interface management
What’s planned for the future?
• Development of mature areas– Life extension programmes– New developments using existing (ageing) infrastructure
• New developments– Deeper water – Remote locations difficult to support– Higher pressures (20k) and temperatures– Full scale subsea processing
• Field abandonment - requirements typically include– Decommission and decontamination– Well abandonment– Above mudline structures recovered– Pipelines either recovered or abandoned if trenched
Challenges for the future
• Materials – close to the limit of affordable technology– Steel still rules due to cost, manufacturing capacity, “inertia”– Composites and non-metallics only used for special applications– Limited ability to fabricate sophisticated materials in emerging
economies
• Design codes barely keeping up with today’s performance requirements
• Development of autonomous vehicle capabilities • Equipment and infrastructure life extension programmes• Evermore powerful environmental lobby• Cost effective, environmentally friendly field abandonment• Severe CAPEX and OPEX constraints
Subsea Equipment Past, Present and Future
Schiehallion ‘cartoon’
INSIGNIFICANTMAN
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