Floating Structures - Vol 1 - CH 1

Detailed contents
1 Concept selection and basic design principles

1.1 Introduction 1
1.1.1 Use of floating structures 1
1.1.2 Riser systems 4
1.1.3 Well completion 5
1.2 Types of compliant structure 6
1.2.1 Ship-shaped structures 7
1.2.2 Semi-submersibles (Column-stabilised units) 9
1.2.3 Tension leg platforms 11
1.2.4 Spars 12
1.2.5 Other concepts 13
1.3 Concept selection 14
1.3.1 Development strategy 14
1.3.2 Platform options 16
1.3.3 Field requirements that drive concept selection 18
1.3.4 Performance requirements 23
1.3.5 Concept selection 23
1.3.6 Summary 25
1.4 Design principles and practice 25
1.4.1 Philosophy of design integrity and safety 25
1.4.2 Stability 27
1.4.3 Station keeping 27
1.4.4 Motion response 27
1.4.5 Structural integrity 27
1.4.6 Instrumentation 28
1.5 Regulations 28
1.5.1 Classification 28
1.5.2 Government regulations 28
1.5.3 Recommended practices 29
1.5.4 Unification 29
1.6 Project strategy 29
1.6.1 Commercial constraints 30
1.6.2 Functional requirements 30
1.6.3 Concept definition 32
1.6.4 Technical solution 32
1.6.5 Schedule 33
1.6.6 Weight control and payload estimate 34 xvi Floating structures: a guide for design and analysis
1.7 Analysis 34
1.7.1 Extreme environmental data required for analysis 37
1.7.2 Hydrostatics 41
1.7.3 Hydrodynamic loading and response models 42
1.7.4 Mooring / DP models 43
1.7.5 Riser models 44
1.7.6 Global structure models 44
1.7.7 Local detail SCFs 45
1.7.8 Local detail models 45
1.7.9 Yield / buckling checks 45
1.7.10 Fatigue analysis 46
References 46
lA Worldwide floating production platforms 47
IB API recommended practices 51
Ie The UK re gulatory regime 52 A close relationship with clients has always been part of Bluewater's way of achieving goals; providing the industry with the best solution for the job.

I

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Over time Bluewater has developed leading technology on turrets, swivels and mooring systems. Our expertise in commissioning and operating FPSOs have contributed to the success of our clients.

Give us the opportunity to share goals with you on your next FPSO project, and you will benefit from the economics of our solutions.

Phone +32 3 6700 260,

Fax +32 3 6700 269. www.bluewater-offshore.com

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1 Concept selection and design principles

1 .1 Introduction

The first practical application of a floating platform was a pivotal event in the development of human civilisation. It lead to two-thirds of the earth becoming navigable and the resources of the ocean exploitable. Exploration and harvesting/production has continued through the ages and is presently being pursued in search of hydrocarbons and other mineral resources.

The prime potential locations of petroleum reserves will have had a plentiful supply of organically rich sedimentary material, often deposited in confined basins with restricted circulation. However, the phenomena of continental drift, major climatic changes over the millennia and the migration of hydrocarbon fluids lead to the discovery of petroleum deposits under areas that are now very different. Most offshore hydrocarbon deposits are expected to be located under the continental shelf and on the slope from the shelf down to the deep ocean floor. The bulk of today' s offshore hydrocarbon reserves comes from developments on the continental shelf in relatively shallow water. However as the size of discoveries in the mature basins diminishes, there is an increasing shift towards exploration in deeper water. Typically the edge of the continental shelf is at about 200 metres water depth and the slope extends to 2500 - 3000 m. Therefore future exploration ofthe continental margins, down to about 3,000 m, may be expected but there will be little justification for prospecting for oil in the deep oceans.

1.1.1 Use of floating structures

The development of the offshore industry commenced with the use of fixed structures. As development accelerated with the discovery of oil and gas in deeper waters, the use of floating structures became commonplace. Once preliminary geophysical investigations indicate the potential for hydrocarbons several major activities, which may overlap, are required to recover these hydrocarbons from below the seabed, namely:

• exploration drilling,
.. well testing,
" pre-production drilling,
.. early production,
• production
• export,
e storage,
• work-over. Exploration drilling, to find oil, is performed offshore using three main classes of drilling platforms: selfelevating platforms (jack-ups), semi-submersibles and drill ships. Some drilling is also undertaken from barges.

Well testing, to determine production rates and field life, may initially be performed using the drilling platform but only short (and therefore often unreliable) tests are practical, during which the oil is burnt, owing to the lack of oil storage. Therefore extended well testing may be carried out using a production tanker (such as Petrojarl I).

Pre-production drilling, of the large number of wells required to produce the oil, and the 'completion' (installation of tubing, filters, valves etc.) will be undertaken from a semi-submersible or monohull vessel before the main production platform is installed. This allows oil production to start soon after the production platform arrives on the field.

Oil, water, gas sepa rotors

1-2 Floating structures: a gUide for design and analysis

Water injection plant physicolly and biologically cleans and pumps seowoter down riser to mointoinf reservoir pressure '\

Water inlet

Further gas processing removes H2 S and CO2

\ Flcce~

Oil export to shuttle ton ker

Water injection riser

Clean, separated water discharged to sea

Oil storage tank (one of several) Tankers or Spars only

Shuttle tanker

Oil import riser '~Gas injection riser

II

Key

Gas

Oil

Water

Reservoi

In j ected water pus h oil to platform

Seabed

/

/

/

Injected gas pushes oil to platform

I and/ or may be used for storage

I prior to recovery at a later stage of field development

Gas lift

(not shown) may be used:

gas is injected at the bottom of

the well to reduce oil density and help lift it to the surface

/ Geological structure traps oil and gas in permeable rock

under impermeable rock

Gas

Oil

Figure 1.1 Simplified key features of a floating production, storage and offloading system

Concept selection and design principles 1-3

Figure 1.2 Floating platforms used by the offshore oil industry (OPL)

Production platforms receive the oil from the well and separate out water, hydrocarbon and other gases to make the products of interest suitable for export via pipeline or tanker. They will also typically inject water or gas to maintain the pressure required for the oil to flow. They have, in the past, typically had a single location design life of about 20 years and thus have not required mobility. Nowshorter life fields are being developed where the opportunity for redeployment is possible. Many deep water fields are likely to have significant volumes of associated gas, which adds substantially to the difficulty and cost of installing a production facility to tap the oil reserves. The flaring of large volumes of gas is becoming increasingly unacceptable on environmental grounds and to conserve non renewable hydrocarbon resources, and is prohibited in some offshore areas. In some fields gas flaring may be necessary if oil is to be produced economically but in the majority of cases gas must be exported for sale or disposed of by re-injection into the reservoir or an adjacent formation. Simplistically, Figure 1.1 shows the key features of a floating production platform. Figure 1.2 shows various proposed and actual practical arrangements of floating production platforms.

Early production is simply producing oil soon after it is discovered, in order to improve cash flow. This early production might be combined with extended well testing described above.

Export: As developments move further offshore or as field sizes become smaller, it may not be cost effective to construct a pipeline export system. Instead shuttle tankers may be used to transport the product to shore.

1-4 Floating structures: a guide for design and analysis

Storage of the hydrocarbons temporarily offshore allows production to continue when export is via shuttle tanker but no shuttle tankers are on the field. Storage may be accomplished by:

• a permanently moored ~forage tanker,

a combined production 'and storage platform, or

• using multiple storage/shuttle tankers.

Work-over is the maintenance of the well and reservoir required to keep the oil flowing at a satisfactory rate. Light work-over involves lowering tools into the well and can be done from a small, relatively cheap, vessel without a rigid riser (a pipe connecting the vessel to the subsea well). Heavy work-over, involves e.g. removing downhole tubing, and must be performed through a rigid riser. This will require a platform with satisfactory motion characteristics for the time that work-over operations are required. If frequent heavy work-over is required it will be advantageous to have a production platform that can also undertake the work-over. If only light or infrequent heavy work-over is required then a separate platform may be used.

1 .1 .2 Riser systems

The riser system is a key component of a floating production system and it has a large influence on the selection of hull type. There are presently three main types of riser:

• rigid: usually steel, nominally vertical, top tensioned pipes,

• flexible: usually steel-polymer composite pipes hung in a simple or S shaped catenary,

• metal catenary risers: steel or possibly titanium pipe hung in a catenary.

Reinforced Thermoplastic Pipe (RTP) is emerging as a promising alternative material for risers and flow lines.

The different riser types have different functional capabilities but may not be suitable at all or may not be suitable for continuous use with all platform types, so the selection of riser and platform type involves compromises. These compromises are discussed later in this Chapter. Here some limitations of the different riser systems are discussed.

Most versatile for the production are vertical steel rigid risers. They can be manufactured in a large range of diameters, can be made suitable for high internal and external pressures and can be designed to handle aggressive fluids. Drilling and work-over (well maintenance) also generally requires a vertical rigid riser.

However the rigid riser is only satisfactory if the motion of the platform is relatively small and this requires either a benign environment or a platform with good response characteristics.

The following indicates how the riser type is limited by platform motion, relative to the axial or radial direction of the riser, and space limitations:

• If the radial motion is always very small (e.g. a few hundred mm) then rigid steel risers can be used with the trees (the valves used to control the oil flow) placed on the vessel. Some form of heave compensation system can be used to allow for the small relative movement between each riser and the vessel. Each rigid riser can be used both for production and light work-over of its single well. By replacing the production riser with a drilling riser, and given suitable derrick facilities, heavy work-over can also be undertaken.

• If the radial motion is moderate (e.g. always less than a few metres) then more complex heave compensation systems may be used but the space required for each compensator has to date limited the number of rigid risers that can be deployed.


& If the motion is sometimes large, and the number of risers small, it is practical to put the tree system on the seabed and to disconnect the risers when the weather deteriorates. It is not practical to disconnect a large number of rigid risers.

The limitations on the above two cases may be overcome by placing the trees on the seabed and using either permanently connected flexible risers or several wells manifolded on the sea bed with the oil co-mingled and produced through a disconnectable single riser. In either case drilling and work-over would be performed with a separate temporary rigid riser.

If the motion is often high then the platform may only be suitable for use with flexible risers and seabed trees.

The Spar concept (see Section 1.2.4) and mid-depth completions (see Section 1.1.3) use a mixture of rigid riser and flexible hose or riser to obtain some of the benefits of a rigid riser whilst allowing larger relative radial motions.

The rapid growth in demand for flexible pipe riser and flowline systems has been associated with significant increases in understanding and design capability. However, the complexity ofthis product still leaves substantial areas of uncertainty in applying flexible pipe in deep water fields and a lower than desirable reliability. The suitability of flexible pipe for application in water depths greater than 1,000 m and in sour reservoirs has still to be demonstrated. Temperature limitations continue to be a source of concern in some applications. The current pressure and diameter capability provides constraints in many deep water applications. Some integrated service umbilicals and all multi-bore risers require further development work to confirm their suitability for deep water application.

The use of steel catenary risers has been demonstrated on the Auger TLP where they provide an attractive and cost effective alternative to flexibles. These are now being studied for use with other floating systems such as semi-submersibles, moored barges and FPSOs in both steel and titanium alloys.

1.1.3 Well completion

The characteristics of the reservoir and the well fluids need to be accounted for in the design of the production facilities but for some field developments this may result in the need for frequent intervention in the well. Well intervention may be necessary to maintain optimum performance due to mechanical failure, build up of sand, the effects of corrosion and wear or the need to open or close production from different levels.

Well intervention capability is linked to the well configuration which in tum is linked to specific development concepts. Three generic well configurations can be identified (Holmes and Verghese, 1995) with the 'trees ' (well top valve systems) at different levels. These are:

surface well completion, mid depth well completion,

seabed well completion tied back to:

- adj acent surface facility

- remote surface facility.

Surface well completion

This configuration has the tree at the surface and is used on TLPs, Compliant Towers and some types of Spar (see Section 1.2). Its principle attraction is that the completion is accessible from the drill floor and well re-entry for both light and heavy work-over is feasible at the surface facility. The main limitation is that it only allows a single drilling centre.

Mid depth well completion

This completion has the trees located on a self-buoyant structure below sea level with seabed wells tied back individually via rigid risers to the buoyant structure. Co-mingled well fluids are transferred to a surface facility


via flexible risers. Potentially it could be used with semi-submersibles or FPSOs (see Section 1.2). The idea of this configuration is to have the trees accessible by divers for maintenance, to facilitate well work-over with a dynamically positioned (OP) work boat and to simplify the surface facility. So far this completion has not been used in practice.

Seabed completion

The conventional subsea completion has the tree on the sea bed either in a template or as an individual cluster well. This can be tied back by flowlines and risers to a surface facility in two ways:

Adjacent surface facility: Here the wells are located under the surface facility which is configured for drilling and/or well intervention.

Remote surface facility: Here the wells are located some distance from the surface facility; this could be only a few kilometres in the case of a typical floating platform development or a much greater distance in the case of subsea tie back from deep water to a shallow water platform.

Typically subsea wells in the North Sea are entered every 4-5 years whereas surface completed wells in the Gulf of Mexico are often entered more than twice per year. To enter a subsea well requires a mobile drilling rig or a coil tubing work-over vessel which is a relatively expensive operation. Fora surface completed well, intervention is more straightforward and less costly. This means that where a relatively high well intervention frequency is anticipated, there is a strong incentive to have surface completed wells. In deep water this may lead to the selection of a field development concept that has surface completed wells, and involve increasing Capex (Capital expenditure) to reduce Opex (Operating expenditure) so as to improve overall field economics.

1 .2 Types of compliant structure

The pioneering nature of the search for hydrocarbons from beneath the ocean has resulted in many innovative engineering solutions. As confidence has grown in the successful application of engineering solutions to the development of offshore oilfields so the industry has required:

• searching for oil in ever increasing water depths,

• producing oil in areas that do not have a pipeline infrastructure for exporting the oil,

• economic oil production from small 'marginal' fields, with field lives of only a few years (that do not justify the expense of a permanent platform),

• production very soon after discovery (oil exploration is expensive so oil companies can be more profitable by producing oil quickly in order to improve cash flow).

All these pressures have lead to an increase in numbers and diversity of floating structures used for oil field development throughout the 1980's and 90's. The focus of this book is the engineering design and analysis of these floating structures used in the exploration and production of hydrocarbons. Figure 1.2 illustrates the immense variety of floating structures available to the industry. These include ship shaped vessels, column stabilised semi-submersible platforms, Spars and tension leg platforms. The principles and techniques described in relation to these four major classes of floating structures should provide guidance for the design and analysis of more novel concepts than are currently being proposed but which will no doubt be developed in the future.

The primary concepts considered for floating oil production are FPSOs, semi-submersibles, TLPs and Spars. Other concepts which may be used as alternatives or in conjunction with floating systems are jackets, compliant towers and sub-sea tie backs. New concepts are always being evolved and proposed which attempt to optimise the capabilities of the concept from experience obtained so far with 'classical' designs (see for example, Madsen and Gallimore, 1993). Figure 1.3 (Brown and Root, 1994) is a simplified indication of the relative capital costs of the different concepts when used West of Shetland. Note that cost comparisons are area specific because not all platforms are suitable for storage or drilling and these have different costslbenefits in different locations. Presently used concepts are discussed below.

concept selection and design principles 1-7

1200

~ 1000 d#>

Ul o

u 1500

3000

i# 2500

UJ C o

E 800

Ul C o

if) o U

E 2000

~

600

400

200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000

Woter depth (rn)

200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000 Water depth (m)

Figure 1.3a Cost comparison for deep water developments production rate 50 million barrels of oil per day (Brown and Root, 1994)

Figure 1.3b Cost comparison for deep water developments production rate 250 million barrels of oil per day (Brown and Root, 1994)

1.2.1 Ship-shaped structures

Drillships

Drillships form a significant part of the total mobile drilling unit population of the world but are used predominantly in areas with long periods of calm weather due to their poor heave response characteristics.

Floating storage units (FSUs)

Floating storage units, converted tankers, have been used for many years in conjunction with both fixed and floating production platforms (Steeves, 1989) when economics dictate that the use of shuttle tankers is most economic or when pipelines have yet to be completed.

Floating production storage and offloading units (FPSOs)

For the combined production, storage and offloading to a shuttle tanker, the ship-shaped floating structures (Figure 1.4) are often cost effective. This is demonstrated by Figure 1.3 and the present proliferation of single point moored FPSO systems. Note however that the FPSO is not directly comparable with the other platform types because it has storage but no drilling capability.

The ship-shaped structure provides ample work area, deck load and storage capacity, structural strength, mobility (if desired) and relatively cheap construction. However, as a result of its large displaced volume close to the waterline, the wave induced response of these structures is quite significant. Therefore, the station keeping systems and dependent systems such as risers must be designed to accommodate these motions. The riser systems therefore need to be flexible. However, the recent advances in flexible riser technology have permitted ship-shaped vessels to be used as production platforms even in harsh environments in recent years (e.g. Foinaven and Schiehallion). In shallow waters, tanker based production systems have been cost competitive against fixed structures and increasingly they are now being extended into deep water with relatively easy changes to the mooring and riser system (Inglis, 1993; Henery and Inglis, 1995). They are well suited for production duties in oil fields which do not require frequent work-over (well maintenance) because in most environments the horizontal and vertical motions are too great to allow this.

Both new-build FPSOs and tanker conversions have a role to play, with selection being based on the particular field requirements. More hostile environments and longer field lives favour the new-build but milder environment and shorter field lives are ideal for conversions, which can be executed very quickly. The important step is to


make a site specific assessment of the global structural response and assess the impact of fatigue damage. Evidence seems to suggest that in broad terms once the 100 year design sea state exceeds 10 metres significant wave height, the long term use of a converted tanker results in reduced structural reliability. The fatigue damage needs to be viewed in terms'Cif"the life cycle cost to maintain adequate structural integrity.

Oil import from re rnot e

/ Gas incinerater

/ (alternative to flare)

________ Process equipment

oil star-age

Turret, with fluid swivels (or equivalent), possibly mooring winches

Thruster

Import flexible risers and control lines

Export flexible riser

/ (alternative to tandem mooring

/ and direct oil transfer)

Oil export pipeline

Mooring lines

~onchors

Figure 1.4 FPSO

A short schedule is one of the key advantages of a FPSO development. Figure 1.S shows a typical new-build FPSO schedule of2.S years compared to that for a TLP which is 1.S to 2 years longer. With a tanker conversion, schedules ofless than two years are possible. Also the development of smaller fields can often become economic if a non-purpose built structure can be used by simply chartering the unit for the I-S year projected life of the small field. Furthermore, if the unit can be used for extended well testing in conjunction with early production of oil there is a substantial cash flow benefit to the oil company.

Year

3

5

Mate/ Install

... Start -up

2

4

6

MiIDllP

AugerllP

Anasuria FPSO (New build)

FPSO (Typical conversion)

Figure 1.5 Construction schedules (Inglis, 1996)


One of the complexities associated with ship-shaped structures is station-keeping. Excessive environmental forces result when waves are incident on the beam of such a structure. Thus a number of alternative methods of mooring these vessels such as CALM, SALM, articulated towers and soft yoke systems (see Chapter 9) have been developed with the ultimate objective of permitting the ship to weathervane: i.e. rotate according to the direction. of the external forces. Thruster assistance may also be provided to reduce force and motions. In recent years, integral turret moorings have been developed to allow weather vaning, provide higher levels of structural safety, and provide opportunities for more flow and control lines to be utilised.

The mooring systems for catenary anchored floaters still offer scope for improved reliability and cost effectiveness, both in shallow and deep water. Some specific areas for further development are the simplification of the FP S 0 turret mooring system, both in its configuration and mechanical design, greater use of reliability techniques in the design of catenary moorings together with improved understanding of component behaviour, and development of the taut leg polyester mooring system for deep water.

In extremely mild and or directional environments (e.g. West Africa), spread moored barges and ships have been used as floating production facilities as the weather from the beam is sufficiently small to allow the moorings to withstand these without having to weathervane. It may also be possible to use rigid steel risers and even surface trees in conjunction with a ship/barge shaped structure in very mild conditions.

1.2.2 Semi-submersibles (Column stabilised units)

Process equipment (separators, inj ection, compression, flo ring

ond power generation equipment)

Deck~

/ Drilling/workover / -: Accommodation

/ >Winches

@

derrick

Flexible risers

(oil import, gas/water injection, well control)

Chain and/or wire mooring line

Drilling/workover rigid steel riser

Anchors or anchor Piles~

Wells under platform

Pipeline importing ail/gas from

a remote well

~

\ Manifolds

__ - Pipeline exporting oil/gas to land, adjacent platform or a floating storage unit

Figure 1.6 Semi-submersible

Semi-submersibles are a common type of floating structure used in the exploration and production of offshore hydrocarbons. Figure 1,6 identifies the main features of a typical semi-submersible. These structures often comprise two submerged horizontal pontoons which provide the main buoyancy for the platform but act as catamaran hulls when moving location at low draft. Alternatively (as shown) a ring pontoon may be used for a


fixed location. Typically, four to eight vertical, surface piercing columns are connected to these pontoons. The columns themselves may have cross and horizontal bracing to provide structural strength and triangulated rigidity for the platform. The deck of the platform is located at the top of the columns. The minimal water plane area contributed by the vertical columns results in long heave, pitch and roll natural periods (with heave natural period being a critical parameter for dhlling units) and the heave, pitch and roll hydrodynamic loading can be minimised at the dominant wave period by careful selection of pontoon volume and waterplane area. These features lead to good response characteristics in typical operating weather conditions.

The good response characteristics provide an excellent platform for both drilling and production uses. However the improved motion compared with ship-shaped vessels is achieved at the expense of increased structural complexity and sensitivity of stability and draught to payload and position. Owing to this sensitivity, and because they have mainly been designed as drilling units, they do not normally have any oil storage capacity.

The two main attractions of semi-submersibles are:

• Owing to their good motion response, they can be positioned over a well template to provide work over or possibly drilling capability.

• Because they do not need to weathervane like a ship, they can support a large number of flexible risers.

Petrobras, who operate the most semi-submersible FPS, have units with more than 50 risers tied in from remote wells. A good example of a semi-submersible being positioned over a template is the Liuhua FPS which provides a means to recover and change out down-hole electrical submersible pumps. However if the floater only has a work-over capability, wells must be pre-drilled and adding new wells later requires an additional semi-submersible to be brought onto the field to drill those wells.

The main disadvantages of a semi-submersible are that:

• Unless pipeline export is possible, a FSU or direct shuttle loading system is required. The investment in a deep water FSU goes much of the way towards the cost ofa FPSO, so, providing only limited workover is required, the FPSO will be a cheaper solution.

The motions, whilst considerably smaller than those of a ship-shaped structure, are still too large to permit rigid risers to be continuously connected in all weather conditions.

• Only a limited number of rigid risers can be supported because of the bulk of the tensioner systems

required.

• Conversions only have a limited topside weight capacity.

• Subsea well re-entry from a semi -submersible is not as convenient as surface well re-entry from a TLP.

• Build schedules for semi-submersibles are generally longer than those ofFPSOs,

Deep draught semi-submersible shaped floaters will further reduce motion and may allow oil storage.

Station keeping is achieved primarily by chain/wire mooring systems. A number of rigs are also fitted with azimuthing thruster capacity to relieve loads in the mooring system and assist in transit. A number of semisubmersibles also have dynamic positioning systems (with computer controlled thrusters which respond to displacement or acceleration) which permit their operation in deeper waters where moorings may be impractical.

Most semi-submersible floating production systems are based on converted drilling rigs. For larger fields in deeper water the topside payloads become larger so that only the larger drilling rigs are suitable for conversion to FPS unless very substantial conversions (providing extra buoyancy and stability) are undertaken. However, the increasing demand for drilling deep water wells is forcing up day rates of the limited number of large deep water rigs. In this situation it is counter productive for oil companies to convert large drilling rigs and building new semi-submersible floating production systems is preferred.


1.2.3 Tension leg platforms

The heave, roll and pitch motion of a floating structure is often a controlling factor in its operability. The high strength tethers of a TLP (Figure 1.7), whilst allowing surge, sway and yaw, limit the important motions and allow uninterrupted drilling and the use of surface trees. The vertical tethers are designed to try and avoid resonances by putting the natural periods in heave, pitch and roll below the wave periods and those in surge, sway and yaw well above the wave period range.

Process equipment (separators, injection, compression, flaring

and power generation equipment)

~

~ Drilling/worfZover ~ Accommodation G>

derrick

Flexible risers

(oil import, gas/water injection, control,

for remote wells)

Tether top connection and flexible joint

/ Tether group

Pipelines importing\ oil/gas from

remote wells

===-....

Production (impod)/wol'kover injection, control and drilling: rigid steel risers

Oil export

flexible ~ Tether anchorages

riser tl /111

/ II 1- .i-> Wells under platform

Wellheads 1-------

IIII

111I

\ Manifolds

__ -- Pipeline exporting oil/gas to land, adjacent platform or a floating storage unit

Figure 1.7 TLP

Tension leg platforms typically have 3 to 6 vertical surface piercing columns with a complete ring of pontoons because this is structurally more efficient and the TLP is not moved from location to location. TLPs have a sensitivity to payload through its effect on tether tensions. Excessive deck load may result in slack tether conditions in large waves, They are therefore not used for oil storage.

The installation, in the Hutton field in 1984, and the successful performance of the world's first tension leg oil production platform has spawned others. Several, very different TLPs have been installed to date. Of these all have pipeline export except Heidrun which has direct shuttle loading.


One of the main thrusts for future TLP projects is to reduce the long cycle time from start of design to first oil, which is currently some 4 years. One possible way of doing this is to de-couple the deck design from the substructure and accept a less optimised solution.

There is also interest in mini- TL~s, supporting just the well system with minimum facilities. Several designs have been made in recent years offering an alternative to subsea templates with the intervention advantages of surface completed wells.

TLPs are in principle capable of being reinstalled at a different location when production at the initial field comes to an end. However, no experience of reinstallation of a TLP at a different location has been gained to date.

1.2.4 Spars

The use of a Spar, as a storage unit, was pioneered in the Brent Field in 1976 and more recently for the floating loading platform for the Draugen field offshore Norway. Over the last decade there have been numerous design studies for production Spars and one is now in place on Oryx's Neptune field in the Gulf of Mexico.

Spars (with vertical circular cylindrical geometry as shown in Figure l.8), by virtue of the large draught, have significantly reduced heave response and the possibility of oil storage. The reduced heave response permits the use of surface trees and rigid risers, thus allowing drilling and work-over without the need for an extra drilling rig. Indeed, this concept is only one of two designs (the other being the TLP) of floating production facilities where surface trees have so far been used. Furthermore, rigid vertical risers can be used in greater water depths and with higher temperature/pressure fluids than presently possible with the flexible risers commonly used with FPSO and semi-submersible floating structure concepts. The rigid risers are self buoyant and are only guided by the platform so no tensioning mechanisms are required.

The Spars installed to date have been compliantly moored to allow motion in all six degrees of freedom. However a tether mooring, making them into a single column TLP, is a possible alternative.

A production Spar may be configured in a number of different ways, either with or without oil storage and with surface or subsea completed wells. These options are shown in Table 1.1.

No oil storage

Integral oil storage

Subsea wells

Oryx 'Neptune' Spar Competitor for TLP

Mini-Spar or 'Nomad'

Best characteristics of TLP and FPSO?

Surface completion

Competitor for FPSO

Table 1.1 Spar options

Configured with oil storage and surface completed wells, a Spar may be able to combine the best characteristics ofthe TLP and FPSO for fields where the reservoir can be reached from one drilling centre.

In the Gulf of Mexico, where the large infrastructure provides oil export routes with pipelines, it is natural that the Neptune Spar is configured without oil storage. By supporting surface completed wells with buoyancy applied to the risers, the Neptune Spar is acting as a direct competitor to a TLP.

Configured without oil storage and connected to subsea wells, the Spar can provide a low cost platform for a light weight topsides. TIns topside may contain pumps for multi-phase pressure boosting, and in this form is currently marketed as the 'Nomad' concept. It could also provide a means of dehydration for a remote satellite field.

Provided with oil ~torage and subsea (rather than surface) wells, the Spar is a competitor for the FPSO, but in general it is expected that the FPSO will be cheaper when subsea wells are acceptable.


Process equipment (separators, /Drilling/workover derrick

injection, compression, flaring

and power generation equipment)

/ Accommodation

DeCk~A""/l'V1~ ~~r@ Outer hull wall Inner hull wall

Flexible risers for remote wells (ail import,

gas/water injecti~ well control) ~

Fairleads

Moanpool (open at bottom)

'~--+-+--- Risers and supporting floats

Tonks lor buoyancy,

water ballast and oil storage

Horizontal section through hull

Note: risers shown in a line but an array would be more realistic

Drilling poduction/workover rigid steel risers supported on floats within moon pool

/ Chain and/or wire mooring line

Oil export flexible riser

To onchors

or anchor piles

Pipeline importing Oil/gas from

a remote well

~

platform

\ Manifolds

~ Pipeline exporting oil/gas # - to land, adjacent platform or a shuttle tanker

Figure 1.8 Spar

1.2.5 Other concepts

A munber of other concepts may be used in conjunction with or may be in competition with floating platforms, these include fixed platforms, compliant towers and subsea completions,

Fixed platforms

Fixed platforms are preferable to floating production systems for large fields in small-medium water depths. The long term lower operating costs and probably better reliability compensate for the possibly greater initial costs and time to first oil. However for deep water (greater than about 150m) or more marginal fields (field life less than perhaps 10 years) the fixed platform is not economic.


Where no oil storage is required then the fixed platform may be a jacket type. When oil storage is required then a gravity platform or jacket plus FSU may be used.

As the water depth increases stfq stiff jacket structure with natural surge periods less than 3 -4 seconds becomes difficult to design and it becomes better to place the surge periods at greater than about 30 seconds to avoid the large amounts of wave energy between 10 and 25 seconds. This leads to a compliant tower or a floating structure. Owing to non-linear wave forces the 10 to 20 second waves will result in longer period' slow drift' loading and an even longer surge period, up to about 200 seconds, may be selected, depending on the environment and platform.

Compliant towers

There are numerous different configurations of compliant tower, but the best ones are those that have no moving parts and achieve compliancy (i.e. long natural period) by careful design of the mass and stiffness (particularly pile stiffness) distribution. The most attractive aspect of a compliant tower is that once installed it has the capabilities of a fixed jacket with respect to supporting surface completed wells and having a high topside load capacity. It is most suited to a field requiring a high number of wells drilled from one location. However, due to its long development schedule and the fact that the wells must be drilled sequentially from the compliant tower to capitalise on its capabilities, there tends to be a long period between the capital investment and the revenue which may hurt the field economics.

Compliant towers tend to work best at intermediate water depths, say 400 - 700 metres where the steel weight is still not too high and installation is somewhat easier. Since they have no storage capability, they are most likely to be economic when a relatively short pipeline connection to an export route is possible.

Subsea

Subsea developments are a natural way to produce fields where nearby infra-structure can serve as a hub or host platform. This implies more subsea developments as a deep water area matures and acquires infra-structure. Development schedules are short. The challenges are primarily focussed on hydraulics and flow in long pipelines, issues of subsea facilities control and deep water installation. Technology development is continually increasing the industries capabilities in this respect and subsea developments are certain to playa large role in producing oil and gas from deep water. Frequently sub-sea developments are used in conjunction with floating platforms.

1 .3 Concept selection

1.3.1 Development strategy

In the life cycle of a project, it is in the development planning stage that there is the greatest potential to impact the earning power, see Figure 1.9. Once a project moves into an execution phase, the project team has somewhat limited impact on earning power through budget and overall schedule controls. It is natural then to focus attention on the early field development planning stage to improve the profitability of deep water offshore fields. At this early stage of the field development, decision making is made difficult by very large uncertainties. Managing this uncertainty, to make the right decision with limited knowledge is one of the keys to successful field development planning.

To form a field development strategy, the following steps are taken:

create sub-surface (reservoir) models, select sub-surface development concepts, select surface development concepts, perform safety evaluation,

perform economic evaluation.


These steps are used to choose a promising strategy and then again, iteratively, until an optimum field development strategy is achieved. The following mainly addresses the third step above.

High

100%

Expenditure

Ability to Impact Earning Power

Low

'rears Figure 1.9 Life cycle irnpact on earning power (Inglis, 1996)

The greatest economic risks lie in the sub-surface modelling and it is essential that surface facilities are planned taking account of this uncertainty. If the final development strategy is to be robust in most situations, surface facilities should be selected based on a wide range of probability weighted sub-surface models. This involves determination of the expected monetary value of different development scenarios across the probability weighted range of sub-surface outcomes. Advances in risk modelling and the use of highly efficient field development costing tools makes the use of such techniques possible in a routine and structured way.

One specific use of probability techniques in field development planning is the assessment of the impact, or value, of information. For example the options of proceeding with the development of a discovery, drilling another appraisal well or possibly carrying out an extended production test can be assessed in terms of how much the expenditure to acquire the 'information' impacts the 'value' of the field. If the extra well significantly improves the return on the field, by for example allowing more optimum facilities, then the well is justified.

When determining the economic return from the field, the costs and revenues over the whole field life are important; in many situations the total operating cost (Opex) is similar to the capital expenditure (Capex). Thus cost saving ideas which save Capex must be evaluated taking account of their operating costs through the life and any impact they may have on revenue, by for example changing availability. It must be realised, however, that there is always an optimum availability and chasing the last few per cent of downtime may involve disproportionate cost and have a negative impact on revenue. For example a FPSO with disconnectable mooring may be shut down for some periods, but can have a cheaper mooring system which is not designed for severe storms.

Safety evaluation is a key part of the concept selection process. Some concepts may be significantly less safe than others owing to for instance:

e diving requirements,

• limitations of deck size and layout that puts accommodation at risk from fire and blast,

• excessive motion of a small floating platform that could make helicopter access difficult,

• dependence on non-redundant structural components,

use of key components that are difficult or impossible to inspect.

The UK HSE would expect the ALARP principle (maintaining risk to personnel to be As Low As Reasonably Practical) to be applied. In other countries the authorities may require the risk level to be demonstrably lower than some prescribed level.


One important drive in field development planning is to shorten the time from first discovery to first production, to improve economics. This may involve overlapping field appraisal activities with facilities engineering, see Figure l.10. By overlapping design and fabrication activities Shell, cut TLP projects times, from sanction to first oil, from over five years (Aug~t) to four years (Mars). Different development concepts have different construction times, for example FPSO projdcts can go from sanction to first oil in two years. The shortening of time spent on the important field development planning to reduce cycle time places even greater emphasis on the risk management techniques discussed earlier.

RISKFACfOR

reserve uncertainty

Conventional Full

Reid Development

productivity uncertainty

Early Production System

Extended Well

Test

SCHEDULE

YEAR

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Exploration Appraisal Campeign Construct Fadlrties Production

Exploration Appraisal Campeign Extended Well Test Construct Fad lities Production

Exploration Appraisal Campeign Construct Fadlities Production

Figure 1.10 Deep water development options (Inglis, 1996)

1.3.2 Platform options

II

tIIT:EJ

"":::::*::::::m:::::rm:::::b::::::",::::::~::::::""::::::"-':::::.m:.:.·."'· .... "'· ... b· ... "' .. ",.

:::::::::::::::,::::::::::::::::::::j

•

Steel braced jacket structures are by far the most common production platforms. However, as developments move to deeper waters:

• the cost associated with jacket type platforms spirals (Hamilton and Perret, 1986).

.. the floating structure offers earlier oil production.

• the floater offers a lower risk solution when the nature of the field is uncertain.

• the floater may provide oil storage (required if there is no pipeline infrastructure).

The logic for the use of floating structures then becomes compelling. This together with the fact that floating structures may be moved from location to location (which will become necessary for the development of smaller fields each with perhaps 5 to 10 year production life) suggests that the future for floating structures as production platforms is promising. This versatility has been demonstrated by the pioneering floating production ship, Petrojarl I, which has already been used as a mobile production facility in a number of fields. Annex lA shows that floating structures have already established their credentials as production platforms in some of the key field developments worldwide.

As discussed below floating platforms have both advantages and disadvantages in these various roles. For instance:

.. One of the advantages of using floating platforms is that the well testing phase can be extended and overlapped with the production phase, in order to obtain a better idea of the long term production rates without committing to the large risk of a field specific platform.

.. A disadvantage is that many types of floating platform move too much in larger waves so that drilling or production operations may have to be suspended during storms.

It is clear that in all areas of offshore hydrocarbon extraction, floating structures have a significant role to play. In the following, guidance is given on the selection of suitable concepts and some of the primary analysis requirements are described.


Of the a wide range of mature and novel production system concepts in the industry those most commonly considered have been discussed in Section 1.2 and are summarised in Figure 1.11.

Concept

Main Features

TLP

Custom designed for site specific application Single drilling centre

Surface completed wells

Integral drillinglwork-over facilities

No oil storage; pipeline, FSU or direct tanker loading Tensioned rigid risers for production

Flexibles or steel catenary for import/export Sensitive to topside load

Relatively long development schedule

FPSO

~l

1.1. 'r=<

___/'-- ~ "rt1o
Sub-sea Tie
back to r><'
shallow tQ
water rx tt

New-build or tanker conversion

Remote wells, normally completed subsea Drillinglwork-over requires specialist vessel Integral oil storage & off-loading

Flexible risers

Insensitive to topside load Short development schedule

Custom designed for site specific application Muttiple drilling centres

Remote subsea wells

Well work-over by specialist vessel

No oil storage; oil exported from host platform Hydraulic performance of long flowlines key design issue Topside load capacity/ullage determined by host platform Short development schedule

s~~~rs_ib_l_e _

New-build or conversion

Well option I) Remote subsea wells with work-over by specialist vessel Well option 2) Wells below with integral drilling/work-over facilities

No oil storage; pipeline, FSU or direct tanker loading

Sensitive to topside load

Flexible risers - large number possible Short to medium development schedule

Spar

"

:' 10.

~, ..

Compliant Tower

Custom designed for site specific application Well options:

Single drilling centre, surface completed wells, integral work-over. Remote wells completed subsea by specialist vessel.

Export options:

Integral oil storage, export via offshore loading unit. No oil storage, pipeline or direct tanker loading Tensioned risers, flexibles or steel catenary risers

Medium development schedule

Custom designed for site specific application Single drilling centre

Surface completed wells

Integral drillinglwork-over facilities

No oil storage; pipeline, FSU or direct tanker loading Tensioned rigid risers for production

Flexibles or steel catenary for import/export Insensitive to topside load

Long development schedule

Figure 1.11 Features of main development concepts (Inglis, 1996)


1.3.3 Field requirements that drive concept selection

The production facilities must be matched to the field requirements so it is necessary to examine some of the characteristics that influenceconcept selection. The main factors are:

production volumes, environment,

water depth (influences fixed vs floating, mooring and riser systems selection), distance to shore or infrastructure (pipeline or tanker off loading),

the number of drilling centres required to drain the reservoir,

reservoir fluid,

the well intervention (work-over) frequency, risk to personnel.

The production volumes, how much oil and gas are to be produced, strongly influence concept selection. A small reservoir may be ideal as a subsea tieback but a large one may be impossible to produce in this way due to limited capacity on the host platform. A large field may justify an oil export pipeline, which will allow a wider choice of concepts as will be discussed later. Large volumes of gas will generally dictate large export risers which may be more easily achieved on a TLP or Compliant Tower than a FPSO. What is clear is that Floating Production Systems are no longer confmed to small production rates and that 200,000 bbl/day of oil with up to 200 million scf/day of gas are feasible. Higher production rates will generally require larger deck areas and capacity.

Environmental conditions: Offshore structures must often withstand an extremely harsh environment. In this book, the environmental conditions (wind, wave and current), the resulting loads and their effect on floating structures will be considered. Loads due to ice will not be considered but an overview of ice prone areas will be given. Earthquake loading may often be ignored as (except for the heave, pitch and roll modes of a TLP and more generally for riser and tether systems) the basic compliance of floating structures results in little influence from earthquake loading.

100 Year Wave
Sig. Wave Height Period
(metres) (Seconds)
West of Shetland 18 20
Northern North Sea 15 17
Gulf of Mexico 13 16
Philippines 11 15
Brazil 7 14
West Africa 4 17 Table 1.2 Environmental conditions

Environmental conditions for some of the deep water areas are shown in Table 1.2. Advances in design capability mean that environmental conditions are less of a feasibility issue but do impact concept selection through the cost. For example, deep water TLPs may be feasible in both the mild environment of West Africa and the hostile environment West of Shetland but the amount of steel and hence cost of a TLP would be quite different, and the milder environment will permit other types of platform to be considered so possibly favouring different concepts in the two areas.

Water depth has a strong and direct impact on technical feasibility and cost. The fixed offshore structure Bullwinkle is in a water depth of 412 m and it is unlikely that there will be any larger. The limit for a Gravity Base


Structure (GBS) is probably somewhat less. Floating structures all have minimum water depth limits but as yet undetermined maximum water depth limits. Existing and planned facilities include Auger TLP (872 m); Mars TLP (894 m), Ursa TLP (1200 m); Petrobras XVIII semi-submersible (910 m); Mensa subsea (1675 m).

The increases in water depth for exploration drilling and production over time are shown in Figure l.12. This suggests that the water depth limit for production simply lags that for drilling by 10-15 years. Alternatively there may be little point in drilling prospects which cannot be brought into production within 10 - 15 years.

1970 YEAR

Figure 1.12 Increase in exploration and production water depths with time (Inglis, 1996)

4000m
2000m
1000m
I
h::
w 500m
0
a:
w
~
~
200m
100m
SOm 20m

I
MiSSiSSi~Pi Canyon
n----e 2292 m
? ~ Mensa I~~
V I .' rsa
Marlim 1027m 1200 mG
/ ~~o ~
EXPLORATION DRILLING Auger 872 m
.' -d
/~ ~
Bullwinkle 410 m
V
... ···f ~ L-)
(~JC
l-J HYDROCARBON PRODUCTION
o Platform f.:, Subsea well
0-
1
I I I I I I I I 10m

1950

1960

1980

1990

2000

Distance to shore or an oil terminal has a major impact on the most economical crude export option. A pipeline is generally the preferred solution but if the distance to shore is large, off shore loading to tankers is more cost effective. It is economics based on life-cycle cost that ultimately determines the choice between a pipeline or offshore loading system, and here capital cost, operating cost and tariffs must all be considered.

In most situations in-field oil storage is required to make the offshore loading efficient and avoid repeated production shutdowns. In-field storage may be integral to the production facility (e.g, FPSO, Spar) or stand-alone (e.g. FSU - Floating Storage Unit). The offshore loading facilities may also be integral to the production facility (e.g. FPSO) or stand alone (e.g. OLS - Offshore Loading System). The strategy of retaining a shuttle tanker infield to provide temporary storage, possibly using twin loading systems, looks increasingly attractive and is threatening the traditional role of the FSU.

The main oil export options, illustrated in Figure 1.13, are: production facility without storage + pipeline,

production facility without storage + direct shuttle tanker loading,

production facility without storage + Floating Storage & Off-loading Unit (FSU),

production facility with integral storage plus stand alone Off-loading System (e.g. Spar + OLS), production facility with integral storage & off-loading (e.g. FPSO).

The storage capacity provided on an FP S 0 is a function of the number of shuttle tankers used, the shuttle tanker size, the maximum amount of estimated shuttle tanker waiting time due to weather conditions and distance to nearest port.


Production Facility without storage + pipeline

Production Facility without storage + direct shuttle tanker loading

Production Facility without storage + Floating Storage & Off-loading Unit (FSU)

Production Facility with integral storage + standalone Off-loading System

Production Facility with integral storage & Off-loading Figure 1.13 Crude oil export options(lnglis, 1996)

The FPSO mayretum to port for cargo discharge as does the 'SWOPS' vessel. This option is in general valid only for marginal fields with low production rates and a small number of risers. This solution is perhaps most suited for well testing and early production type of vessels producing through a single riser.


The other aspect of proximity to shore or other existing infra structure is the potential for a subsea tie-back development. Here subsea wells are located in deep water and tied-back to a shallow platform via individual flowlines from separate satellite wells or through a single co-mingled export flowline from a subsea manifold. The tie-back distance record of Togi at 48 km was doubled to 109 km by the 1997 Mensa development.

The number oj drilling centres and the number of wells required at each centre to adequately drain the reservoir is dependent on the field architecture. Advances in extended reach drilling technology have increased the alonghole depth of wells to ahnost 10 km, with horizontal to vertical depth ratios of up to 3 being possible. However, in many situations it is still not possible to efficiently drain the reservoir from one drilling centre. This is often the case when the reservoir is relatively shallow and has a large area, see Figure 1.14. Multiple drilling centres are certainly required where it is planned to have satellite fields tied back to a central production facility. If there are only a small number of drilling centres and frequent drilling or workover is required through the life of the platform then there is some advantage in having a platform with a drilling and work-over capability. Otherwise an additional vessel will be required for these purposes.

Reservoir fluid parameters, production chemistry and hydraulics must all be considered in selecting the optimum development concept. This must encompass the implications of:

.. CO2

.. H2S (naturally occurring as well as from reservoir souring),

.. asphaltene deposition,

.. wax deposition,

.. scale precipitation,

.. hydrate formation, sand production,

.. slugging flow in multiphase flowlines, reservoir pressure and drive mechanisms.

The parameters affect the well intervention (work over) Jrequency as well as the design of the production facilities. Well intervention may be necessary to maintain optimum performance due to mechanical failure, the effects of corrosion and wear or the need to open or close production from different levels.

The risk to personnel will vary with the concept. There will be some variation in risk caused by the different hydrostatic, dynamic and structural behaviour of the different concepts but, for well designed platforms with:

.. adequate reserves of intact and damaged stability,

• adequate ultimate and fatigue strength, and

.. constructed from good toughness steel.

•

these risks should be small.

The variability in risk will be much more associated with:

.. oil and gas import and export,

.. the process system,

.. the layout of the topside equipment,

.. the position of the accommodation,

.. collision with errant vessels (trading vessels, shuttle tanker, supply boat, safety boat),

.. the provision of adequate evacuation systems (free fall lifeboats or other systems),

.. preparations for inclement weather (riser/turret disconnect etc.).

Clearly the platform concept affects these risks but they need to be considered in conjunction by the range of disciplines, not just the naval architects and structural engineers.


TLP at single drilling centre

FPSO with multiple drilling centres

Figure 1.14 TLP and FPSO reservoir arrangement (Inglis, 1996)


1 .3.4 Performance requirements

A floating structure for hydrocarbon drilling, production or export typically has the following performance requirements:

• sufficient work area, deck load capacity and perhaps storage capacity,

• acceptable response to environmental loads,

• adequate stability,

• strength to resist extreme conditions,

• durability to resist fatigue loading,

• may require a combined function (e.g. drilling and production),

• may be transportable.

No one structure type can provide optimum performance with regard to each of the above requirements. Thus, any field development or exploration activity should identify the optimal structure type for the particular task from a number of classes of floating offshore structures. For example, excellent stability characteristics may lead to excessive motions in waves. In response to these conflicting requirements, the offshore industry has developed a wide variety of platforms,

1.3.5 Concept selection

The development concepts identified in Section 1.3.2 above must be matched to the field requirements discussed in Section 1.3.3 to identify likely field development schemes. This has been done for deep water in Table 1.3 based on combinations of: distance to shore, number of drilling centres and well intervention frequency. Whilst there are certainly other factors that may influence concept selection in a particular situation, Table 1.3 appears to be a reasonable predictor of concepts selected in reality.

The logic used in Table 1.3 is as follows.

The concept selection is based primarily on an oil field with associated gas which may be exported, re-injected or possibly flared. For a gas field, possibly with associated liquids, different criteria will apply.

When the distance to shore is short, pipeline export is assumed unless a FPSO is used since this already has an integral export system. Where the distance to shore is long, offshore loading is assumed.

Where the well entry frequency is low, it is assumed that subsea wells will be the cheapest and only concepts with subsea wells are proposed for both single and multiple drilling centres.

For single drilling centres and high well entry frequency, surface trees are preferred. These require TLPs, Compliant Towers or Spars. A semi-submersible with work-over capability is also a candidate.

The combination of multiple drilling centres with wells that need frequent intervention, is accommodated in shallow water by using a well head jacket. In deep water this would require multiple TLPs or Compliant Towers which is not economically viable. No deep water field has yet been developed which combines multiple drilling centres and frequent well intervention but the currently favoured solution is a small unmanned TLP, or mini - TLP, which only supports the wells and provides a capability for drilling and work-over. The mini- TLP has no processing facilities as these are provided by another central facility such as a semi-submersible or FPSO moored close by. It is important to recognise that the mini- TLP is providing an alternative well system to subsea wells and flow lines and that the same production facility can be used in either case.

Another important situation in deep water in which surface completed wells are potentially attractive is where the combination of extended reach drilling from one or more mini- TLPs is simply cheaper or technically more robust than subsea wells, flow-lines and risers. With the recent significant increases in the cost of deep water drilling


units and the potential for relatively cheap mini- TLPs this is becoming a realistic possibility. Again such a system would fit well with the processing, storage and off-loading capability of a FPSO moored close by.

In shallow water (say less thary:ljO m) fixed structures may be expected to be chosen. They are clearly favoured if the field characteristics incl~tle:

single drilling centre,

local pipeline infrastructure,

long field life (greater than 10 years),

• frequent workover requirements.

However even in shallow water an FPSO, in conjunction with subsea wellheads, may become the optimum solution. It would be favoured by:

multiple drilling centres,

• no pipelines, short field life,

infrequent workover requirements.

Distance to shore/ Infrastructure

Number of Drilling Centres

Well Entry Frequency

Development Concept

Low

One

Semi + Subsea + Pipeline SWP + Subsea + Pipeline FPSO + Subsea

High
Short
Low
Multiple
High
Low
One TLP + Pipeline

Compliant Tower + Pipeline Spar + Pipeline

Semi + Mini-TLP + Pipeline

Semi + Subsea(adjacent) + Pipeline SWP + Mini-TLP + Pipeline

FPSO + Mini-TLP

Semi + Subsea + Pipeline SWP + Subsea + Pipeline FPSO + Subsea

Semi + Mini-TLP + Pipeline SWP + Mini-TLP + Pipeline FPSO + Mini-TLP

FPSO + Subsea

Spar + Subsea + OLS

Semi + Subsea + FSU or DTL

High

Long

TLP + FSU or DTL Spar + OLS

Compliant Tower + FSU or DTL FPSO + Mini-TLP

Semi + Subsea/adjacent) + FSU or DTL

Low

MUltiple

FPSO + Subsea

Semi + Subsea + FSU or DTL Spar + Subsea + OLS

High

FPSO + Mini-TLP

Spar + Mini-TLP + OLS

Key:

OLS=Offshore Loading System, DTL=Direct Tanker Loading, FSU=Floating Storage Unit, SWP=Shallow Water Platform

Table 1.3 Deep water field development concept selection guide (Inglis, 1996)


Improved technology, simplification, fit-for-purpose specifications and commercial strategy in the areas of facilities, mooring and vessel are key contributors to low cost. The relatively large space on the deck of FPSOs, allowing greater physical separation of hazards, together with the enlightened use of modern safety engineering principles and the short schedule means that cost savings can be made whilst still achieving high levels of safety.

1.3.6 Summary

With respect to technology the following conclusions can be drawn:

A range of mature development concepts are (in 1998) available for water depths up to 1000 ill. Over the next 10 years there will be demand for production in water depths 1000 - 2000 m. Further technology development is required to:

extend water depth capability, simplify facilities to reduce cost.

Riser systems are the most critical area for further development.

With respect to concept selection, it is concluded that:

Each field has different characteristics that must be accommodated in development concept selection; there is no universal solution.

Early stages of development planning have most potential to impact field economics but are characterised by limited knowledge.

Managing uncertainty to make the right decisions is the key to successful field development planning.

1.4 Design principles and practice

1 .4.1 Philosophy of design integrity and safety

Every structure has a fmite probability of failure. This may be considered on an annual basis or may be related to particular operations. The probability of failure may vary tlirough the life of the structure. It is not possible to design a structure to eliminate this probability of failure. One important objective of design is to reduce the probability of failure to an acceptable level.

The concept of safety factors in design to account for all manner of omissions is timeless and has served humanity well. The selection of these safety factors, however, goes to the core of a society's values. Simplistically, once the mode of failure of a structure is understood, the greater the safety factor, the smaller the probability of failure. But, the greater the safety factor, the greater the cost of producing the structure. Hence the fundamental need for optimisation between cost and safety.

Recognising this need for optimisation, safety factors have been modified over the years primarily by trial and error. Also as greater physical understanding led to increased confidence in the performance of structures, safety factors changed to account for the better knowledge. Major catastrophes provided data on the performance limits of the designs which again helped refme the safety factors. Indeed, the safety factor approach is the basis for most codes, guidelines, recommended practices and regulations applied not only to offshore structures but also every other sphere of structural design.

Early codes tended to put the safety factor on the material strength, so leading to the concept of working or allowable stress design (WSD). An alternative was to put the safety factor on the loads. Since the 1950s a considerable amount of work has been directed towards the rational derivation of safety factors. This has been made possible by theoretical developments in (probabilistic) reliability analysis. This has demonstrated that the most sensible approach is to apply a load factor, essentially to account for the uncertainty in the load and a material factor to account for the uncertainty in the strength. (Other factors may be introduced to account for other


uncertainties.) These methods are known as load and resistance factor design (LRFD) or partial safety factor methods (PSF). It is still generally impossible to precisely quantify reliability so it is usual to calibrate the safety factors against experience with existing designs. It is argued that this leads to LRFD/PSF designs having a more uniform level of reliability acrQ~s structure types and loading regimes than would be obtained from a structure designed using WSD allowable.stresses.

Most calibration studies performed to date have been on fixed structures. It should not be assumed that the safety factors determined for fixed structures are also applicable to floating structures. They have different response characteristics and different design methodologies that may require different factors to be used.

The offshore impact of these developments gathered momentum with the move by the American Petroleum Institute to put its recommended practice for fixed structures, RP2A, on an LRFD basis (Moses, 1989). These techniques have recently been applied to the development of acceptance criteria for jack-ups (Ahilan, Baker and Snell, 1993) and work is currently in progress for its application to Tension Leg Platforms. Therefore, the process of rationalisation of the design integrity of floating structures via the explicit consideration of uncertainties is well under way. Current designs still tend to use the traditional WSD or LRFD approaches but with additional probabilistic analysis techniques to assist in optimisation and to achieve uniform safety levels.

The Piper Alpha disaster and the resulting loss of 167 lives in July 1988 changed the approach to safety in the UK offshore oil industry. Rather than simply designing to codes of practice it was realised that it was necessary to consider the overall safety of the installation, to identify hazards and to, if necessary, modify the structure or procedures until it can be demonstrated that the risk to life is sufficiently small. This is often referred to as a change from prescriptive to goal setting regulation. Often the structural engineering is still performed to codes because a structure properly designed and built to these codes is considered to provide an acceptably low risk. However certain decisions may have much broader effects on the risk levels so minimisation of risk must be a key consideration in concept and detail design. Sometimes probabilistic risk analyses are undertaken in order to quantify the risk. Such approaches (probabilistic and risk analyses) require a good understanding as to the acceptable risks, because without this knowledge, the work based on probabilistic/risk analyses cannot be used within the project decision process. However, definition of acceptable risks is generally complex (for example how does one value the human consequences in order to assign the acceptable probability?) and varies according to each particular situation because of the specific human, economic, political and environmental consequences. A concept for determining this acceptable risk has been introduced by the UK Health and Safety Executive which suggests that the risks of any venture shall be keptAs Low As Reasonably Practicable (ALARP). This formally requires that if a risk reduction measure is practicable, it should be carried out whether the venture already satisfies some 'absolute' risk measure. Others have argued that the acceptability or otherwise must be based upon industry consensus, historical practice and consequences, so that once a venture risk is shown to be equal to or below some target based upon these parameters, any further risk reduction measure is superfluous. This remains an area of discussion and legal interpretation.

This book deals with the design integrity offloating structures and dependent systems such as moorings and risers. It describes the analysis methods which are applied and considers the interaction between various issues, in so far as they affect analysis but the complete systems and safety issues are beyond the scope of this book. It provides all the individual building blocks which are needed in the analysis relating to the integrity of floating offshore structures. These can be divided into five main areas:

environment and loading, stability,

• station keeping,

• motion response, structural integrity.

The last four areas are taken in turn and discussed below.


1.4.2 Stability

A design requirement that is unique to floating structures is that of hydrostatic and dynamic stability. The work platform should be able to remain floating upright in the extreme environmental conditions. Thus the design for stability is a critical part of the floating structure design. It is important to have strict procedures for weight control during construction or upgrade and through the life of the structure. The platforms must also have adequate reserves of stability when certain damage scenarios have occurred, as specified in the rules and regulations. This is to prevent the loss of the platform arising from flooding caused by limited damage to the shell

plating. Guidance on this topic is given in Chapter 4. '

1 .4.3 Station keeping

The floating structure experiences both steady and unsteady loads which cause large displacements from the original target position. The structure is usually held in position using moorings, tethers, dynamic positioning thrusters or a combination of these. The integrity of a number of systems such as risers and gangway bridges depends on the station keeping ability and the limitations of the station keeping systems dictate the limitations in the operability of the floating unit. Thus, the integrity of the station keeping system is a critical facet in the successful design of floating structures. Guidance on analysis of station keeping (taut and catenary moorings, dynamic positioning systems and tethers) and risers is given in Chapters 9, 10 and 11.

1.4.4 Motion response

In contrast with fixed structures, all floating structures are compliant to tarying degrees. Thus their response under the influence of extreme environmental loading is significant, and successful floating structure design requires the optimisation of these responses by judicious selection of dynamic characteristics of the floating structure. For example, water plane area to displacement ratios may be selected to minimise pitch and heave responses at the predominant wave periods and natural period is often engineered to either push it above the wave period range (thus making it truly compliant as for catenary moored semi-submersible) or bring it below (as for TLP heave). Designing to control the motions therefore requires a general understanding of wave loading and its interaction with the structural geometry. Guidance on this is given in Chapters 3 and 5.

1.4.5 Structural integrity

It is a requirement of any structure that it has sufficient strength to withstand operational, extreme and accidental loads. This issue is fundamental because failure can result in catastrophic consequences. Indeed, the capsize of the semi-submersible Alexander Kielland with the loss of 123 lives in 1980 was initiated by the cracking in a brace.

The structural integrity of a platform may be built in and maintained in a number of ways. Firstly, the structure should be designed to withstand the static and environmental loads. This implies that gravity, buoyancy, wind, wave and current loading should be addressed as well as intermittent but extreme impact loads due to slamming. For instance, the air gap - which on semi-submersibles and TLP platforms is the distance between the deepest draught operational waterline and the bottom of the deck - should be chosen to prevent any slamming in extreme seas as platforms are usually not designed to withstand such large impact loads. Secondly, fatigue should be considered, as the predominant loading mechanism on these structures is due to waves and is thus cyclic. Thirdly, the structural members are prone to damage from accidental loads such as ship impact and dropped objects. They must be capable of absorbing the energy, albeit with large deformation, from likely impacts. Finally, any degradation in the construction material with age, through fatigue and corrosion, must be taken into account at the design stage and the material used should be sufficiently tough for any likely fatigue cracks not to reach a critical size and cause a fast fracture and for large deformations to be acceptable without rupture under accidental loading. Guidance on designing to resist these various structural failure mechanisms is given in Chapters 7- 8.

1-28 Floating structures: a gUide for design and analysis

To maintain safety, some structural inspection will probably be required through the life of the structure, The interaction between design, construction and practical levels of inspection should be considered during design,

1.4.6 Instrumentatlon:

Improved understanding of the above four areas - stability, station keeping, motion response and structural integrity - can be obtained from full scale instrumentation, This greater knowledge can improve safety and also reduce costs as already shown by industry's experience with fixed structures, Thus, in any innovative application, instrumentation of the deployed structure should be seriously considered,

1.5 Regulations

Floating structures are subject to the regulations of the state in whose waters they operate, There may be many sets of regulations, ship regulations may be in force when a floating structure is on its way to an oil field, oil production regulations when the structure is installed at the field, Furthermore the regulations may change over time, as in the UK with the change from prescriptive to goal setting requirements, This section only provides an indication of the types of regulations that may affect a floating platform, The naval architect/engineer must determine and apply the regulations that are appropriate for the particular countries where a platform is built and operated, Increasingly reliability and risk analysis is used both within prescribed codes and within the justification of particular platforms to the regulatory authorities,

The regulatory authority requirements can typically be :

• national statutory (legal) requirements,

certifying Authority requirements,

• international regulatory authority requirements,

• flag state requirements,

• classification society requirements,

• requirements of specified national and international standards and codes,

To aid the engineers who will later be involved in the design or identification of the candidate vessels and the development of the technical solutions, it is often prudent to clearly identify and detail the main regulatory authority requirements in the Design Basis document rather than just identify or refer to the applicable regulation or code, This helps to ensure that all project personnel are fully aware of the requirements and their impact on the design or vessel selection and subsequent conversion work Where conflicting requirements occur the most stringent one or the most stringent set of criteria should be clearly identified in the Design Basis document.

1.5.1 Classification

Classification societies have a long history in connection with the shipping industry, Most mobile floating structures, including those which are not ship shaped, also obtain classification from one of the classification societies, Classification society rules have evolved over the years and simply provide a basic design standard for mobile structures, Most mobile drilling units are classified by one of the members of the International Association of Classification Societies (lACS) along with ships, barges, cranes and other support vessels,

1.5.2 Government regulations

Along with fixed offshore structures, all floating structures used for the exploitation of hydrocarbons must satisfy the certification requirements of the country in which the field is located, This certification often imposes more


stringent requirements than those of classification. To operate in the UK continental shelf, every installation must satisfy the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) (see Annex I C). All floating structures directly involved in exploration, exploitation or storage of hydrocarbons on the Norwegian continental shelf must satisfy the regulations of the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate.

1.5.3 Recommended practices

A significant contributor to technical standards associated with offshore exploration and production has been the American Petroleum Institute (API). The API recommended practice for fixed structures, RP2A, is universally recognised and often adopted by the offshore industry in preference to country specific requirements. For instance, the UK Statutory Instrument SI 289 (now superseded) required the use of at least the individual 50-year return conditions in the evaluation of environmental loads on a UK installation but many structures in the UK sector have been designed according to the I OO-year return condition requirements of API. Note however due to the permissibility of joint probability effects in the latter, the API loads may well be less than the collinear, concurrent summation required ofthe SI 289.

API has already published recommended practices for the design ofTLPs and for the moorings of floating drillingand production systems. API has continued its pioneering work with a reliability based model code for Tension Leg Platforms which may be extended to other floating structures. Some of the commonly used API recommended practices are presented in Annex lB.

1.5.4 Unification

The proliferation of national and international codes and classification society rules result inevitably in conflicting requirements for the design of floating structures. This has engendered moves towards the unification of standards. Through the International Standards Organisation (ISO) and the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), unified codes are currently under development for various facets offloating structure design and operation. ISO is developing, with close cooperation from existing code generators and industry, codes which will encompass both fixed and floating structures. IMO is taking charge of the unification of ship related requirements.

At present the fixed structure ISO is expected to be a largely self contained document whereas the floating structure ISO is expected to refer to many other codes and standards such as API RP2V and RP2U for the design of flat plate and curved shell structures.

1.6 Project strategy

This section identifies the main components or 'building blocks' for a floating structure build or conversion project strategy and for a typical floating structure project these are:

• establishment of the project specific commercial constraints,

• identification of the project specific functional requirements,

• identification of the applicable Regulatory Authority requirements,

• concept definition,

• identification of suitable concepts or candidate vessel(s),

• development of the technical detail solutions,

• identification of the scope of work,

• development of realistic project schedule and budget.

The above proposed main components for the strategy are listed in the order they are normally dealt with during a project. However, it should be noted that a number of the above components are dealt with to a certain extent


in parallel and that there also exists a certain amount of 'feed-back' between the components. As an example the identification of the commercial constraints, the functional requirements and the applicable Regulatory Authority requirements can be carried out in parallel but the fmal selected field development concept and any vessel selected for conversion will also to a ceft~in extent determine what rules and regulations will apply.

1 .6.1 Commercial constraints

Before any project can proceed a careful commercial evaluation of the project economic feasibility has to be carried out. Very simply, the revenue the project has to generate (e.g. through the recovery of hydrocarbon reserves at a certain estimated daily production rate) in a particular tax regime has to be sufficient to allow profits to be made and to cover all capital costs, other development costs, the costs of operating the facility and finally the costs associated with the removal and disposal of the facility in an environmentally acceptable manner. The main impact this has on the technical work is that it limits the available technical solutions to those which have estimated capital, operating and removal expenditures within sufficiently low limits to still allow an acceptable profit to be made. It is essential that these limits are clearly defined before any significant technical development work commences.

1 .6.2 Functional requirements

The first technical items to be dealt with are the project specific functional requirements. Here it should be immediately noted that the project specific functional requirements may not be synonymous with the field specific requirements as many vessels operate on marginal fields with relatively short field lives and hence may be designed to be re-located onto other fields in similar environments. The project specific functional or performance requirements concerning the floating structure or system are usually summarized in the 'Functional Specification'.

The main project specific functional requirements to be identified are:

• environmental criteria,

operating requirements,

• import requirements,

• production requirements,

• export requirements,

• manning requirements,

• replenishment requirements,

• removal requirements.

Environmental criteria

In general the first criteria to be identified are the environmental criteria in which the vessel has to operate and survive. If the field life is long then the field specific environmental conditions may be used, otherwise a market location e.g. West Coast of Africa, may be selected and environmental conditions selected which allow the vessel to be used anywhere in the specified market location.

The criteria of interest include:

• water depth including storm surge and tidal information,

• water data (e.g. salinity, temperature profiles and extremes, pollutants),

• wave data,

• current data,

• wind data,

• ambient air temperature and humidity data,

• sea bed soil data.


For certain specific geographic locations additional information may have to be added such as sea ice data, ice load data, earthquake data, etc.

It is important that all relevant environmental data must be clearly identified in the Design Basis document.

Operating requirements

The main operating requirement is usually the limiting environmental conditions in which the platform or system has to be capable of operation.

This may cover the extreme environmental conditions in which the platform has to survive on the field location, the environmental conditions in which the platform has to carry on producing hydrocarbons, the maximum environmental conditions in which any shuttle tanker must stay connected and the worst environmental conditions in which the vessel has to be able to connect up to a shuttle tanker.

For vessels with drilling equipment, the required limiting environmental conditions for the various drilling operations would be specified.

For some vessels this may also include maximum cruising speeds, fuel consumption limits, manoeuvrability requirements, DP system station keeping requirements, limiting environmental criteria for heavy lift operations etc.

Import requirements

The methods of treatment and the quantities of untreated crude oil or natural gas to be imported have to be identified and specified as this determines the type, number and size of import risers.

Production requirements

The main characteristics of the field and the process equipment packages should be clearly detailed and identified:

• field life,

• product production rates,

• process equipment deck area requirements,

• process equipment weight, centre of gravity and mass distribution data,

• process equipment arrangements,

• process hazard data.

For systems involving tanker export, the production rates together with shuttle tanker size, offloading frequency and estimated shuttle tanker waiting time due to the environmental conditions determine the product storage requirements for the production vessel. However, if the product export is via a pipeline then the production rates may be limited by the size of the process equipment and the size of the export riser.

The minimum required process deck area will have to be established and specified relatively early. However, this is seldom a problem for large vessels such as tankers but if the platform is a relatively small semi-submersible, jack-up or smaller ship then the area requirement and the location of the process deck are usually critical.

The process equipment dry and operating weights and their mass distributions are required for lightship, stability and vessel motion calculation purposes.

The process equipment arrangements will be required in order to allow wind loading calculations to be performed mainly as input into stability and mooring analysis calculations.

The hazards imposed by the proposed process equipment must be clearly defined as they determine the hazardous area zones, the rating of the deck equipment, the design criteria for any blast walls, passive fire protection requirement, fire water requirements, etc ..


Manning requirements

These will determine the amount of accommodation etc. required.

Replenishment requirementssc

Consideration should be given;to the provision of regular supplies for operational purposes and the crew members. Adequate handling facilities (generally offshore cranes) should be provided to off-load provisions from supply boats. Laydown platforms should also be provided for the supplies and for any other service and maintenance requirement. Ideally, handling facilities should be provided over the entire deck area.

Removal requirements

Currently the removal requirements vary significantly between geographic regions from various levels of partial removal (to allow unrestricted shipping over the field location) to complete removal down to sea bed level. However, it is generally accepted that as the concern for the environment increases the removal requirements will become increasingly more comprehensive and stringent. This increases the pressure on the designers to design the facilities and equipment to be removable. Increased international competition and consequent commercial pressures in combination with an ever increasing number of small hydrocarbon finds with short production lives being declared as commercially viable have also lead to the need to design the facilities and equipment to be not only removable but also reusable. The reusability requirement also demands that the facilities and system design have to have a significant amount of inbuilt flexibility to allow reuse in different environments, water depths and on fields with different reservoir characteristics and subsea equipment layouts.

As there are definitive needs to design for removal and reusability the criteria and requirements should be clearly established and it should ensured that the subsequently proposed engineering solutions meet the agreed criteria and requirement.

1 .6.3 Concept definition

During this phase (which may be part ofthe concept selection stage described in Section 1.3, or may follow on from it). the field hardware main 'building blocks' or main components are defined Typically these comprise the following main systems:

type of support vessel (i.e. TLP, semi-sub, / jack-up, mono-hull),

• marine system (ballast system, hull ventilation system, thruster system, where applicable, etc.),

• subsea system,

• mooring system,

e riser system,

turret system (if required),

• production system,

drilling facilities (if required),

• export system,

• accommodation unit.

1.6.4 Technical solution

Once the candidate design or vessel is known and, for a conversion, the vessel technical documentation is available, the engineering of the technical solution can commence. It is often beneficial to divide the engineering process into a number of distinct phases, each phase having its own objectives and deliverables. For a typical conversion project the engineering work may be divided into the following three phases:

• front end engineering and design,

• detail engineering and design,

e construction! conversion support engineering.


The first two phases are described below:

Front end engineering and design

During this phase the technical concept is outlined on the global rather than detail level. All the technical solution main 'building blocks' are identified, defined and located on the vessel. Solutions are also identified for all the vessel main systems and components requiring modification, upgrading or replacement.

At this stage the team should not be too large and should work as an integrated team with no discipline barriers, For the work to be carried out successfully the team must be highly experienced 'and have a sufficient range of specialist technical and financial skills, It should consist of an appropriate mix of marine engineers, electrical engineers, instrument engineers and naval architects working closely with the reservoir, drilling subsea, topsides process and cost engineers, Personal experience is backed up with in-house and openly published information, Previously analysed data, e.g, MacGregor and Smith (1994) for FPSO hulls, can be particularly useful at this stage,

Projects are often structured in a manner which allows the project to be terminated at the end of the front end engineering and design phase, should the project capital expenditure estimates based on the budget costs enquiries be too high, If budget cost and schedule estimates in combination with the satisfactory development of a technically acceptable front end engineering solution is acceptable then the project can proceed to detailed engineering, If conversion is selected, at this stage the commercial arrangements can be concluded to reserve the preferred candidate vessel for the project

Detail engineering and design

During this phase the detail engineering of all 'building blocks' commences to transform the concept into detailed design and working drawings, Since the design of every unit has an impact on other disciplines, the importance of inter-discipline communication during this stage cannot be over-emphasized, All package specifications and enquiry packages are issued as soon as possible in this phase to obtain a realistic price, weight and delivery schedule of every component from the vendors,

Particular attention should be paid to the topside/vessel deck interface details where large concentrated forces are delivered to the vessel deck Deck deflections due to environmental forces must be considered in the design of these areas, Interface details should allow for misalignment tolerances between platform structure and topsides support structures,

Fatigue life usually constitutes a critical design consideration, All structural details should be developed to minimize local stress concentrations,

It is important that the warranty surveyor is involved with transportation and installation aspects from the early stages of the project because late modification may be expensive and cause delay,

During this phase the construction/conversion yard is selected and the remaining work is transferred to the yard, This usually consists of the preparation of fabrication drawings and the engineering of secondary and outfit steel.

1.6.5 Schedule

The schedule must be drawn very carefully to achieve the planned 'first oil' date within the budget cost for the success of the project Project targets should be monitored regularly following the schedule critical path, Due to the multi-disciplinary nature of these projects, any delay in one area will always have implication in other disciplines, Particular attention should be paid to long lead delivery items,

The schedule should include all construction, facilities installation, commissioning, tow-out to installation site, laying of mooring lines and hook-up of the sub-sea flow lines, Where the concept requires the use of shuttle tanker for export, the client should ensure availability of the tanker.


1.6.6 Weight control and payload estimate

Weight control and payload estimates are always a critical feature of floating structures. This is especially true for weight sensitive structures slit!; as semi -submersibles and tension leg platforms. The main purpose of weight control and payload estimates ire to ensure that the vessel:

• has adequate stability at all operating and temporary draughts,

• floats on even keel,

• does not have excessive draught at 'float out',

• is capable of carrying the intended payload.

Floating structure weight control is not merely a summation of weights. The addition or removal of a weight usually also causes trim and heel angle changes, which have to be corrected by the removal or addition of ballast. In extreme cases the addition of a weight requires the same weight of ballast to be added in order to maintain even keel thus having a double effect on the payload.

For practical reasons, in the marine industry the vessel weight is divided into the lightship weight and dead weight, and it is proposed that this weight breakdown approach is maintained throughout the conversion phase and subsequent operation phases. The lightship weight is the weight of the vessel complete including hull, machinery, outfit items, equipment, and any other permanently fixed items (including process equipment). The accurate calculation of the lightship weight allows precise estimation of the float-out draught and the determination of the actual lightship centre of gravity position during the inclining test. The deadweight is the carrying capacity of the vessel at a particular draught and includes weight of cargo, fuel, any liquids in any process systems, ballast water, fresh water, stores, crew and their effects. For a vessel with drilling facilities this would also include drill string stored on the pipe rack, drilling mud and other drilling liquids, chemicals and loose items.

1.7 Analysis

This section provides an overview of extreme and fatigue analysis and provides some pointers to relevant parts of the later chapters. Figure 1.15 is a typical pattern of analyses for a floating structure. (The relevant sections of this chapter, and relevant chapters of the book, are shown in brackets.)

In this figure:

• solid rectangular boxes represent data and models used by the various calculation processes,

• light rectangular boxes represent calculation processes,

• 'torn page' boxes represent output.

Note that the same basic models are used for both the strength and fatigue calculations but the calculation processes differ. In practice there are large numbers of analysis options. Also the amount of analysis required to thoroughly check every part of a structure with the worst loading it is likely to see, is very large. Therefore engineering judgement is frequently relied upon to identify worst locations and loading in order to simplify the calculation procedures. Unfortunately the behaviour of most floating structures is very complicated, so different analyses of the same problem, with different engineering judgement input, will often result in significantly different results. This document, because it contains the experience of a large number of individuals, should help to narrow the range of different results however some engineering judgement error is still inevitable. (The same applies to fixed structures. However in the case of fixed structures the analysis assumptions are now more standardised and so the difference between results obtained by different analysts/software should be smaller.)

Non-linear extreme reponse analysis

Basic data and models


Linear fatigue or extreme response

analysis
Environmental data [2]
Extreme data &(1.7.1) Fatigue data

Combinations of sea, frequency domain extreme analysi
swell, current and wind \ Sea state spectra
that contribute to 100 yr Wind spectra
response Hydrostatics
[4]&(1.7.2)

l Hydrodynamic
calculations
Hydrodynamic rigid Hydrodynamic loading Linearised Morison
body response analysis and response model drag plus diffraction.
in time domain [3] & (1.7.3) Loading on fixed
i structure and added
Time domain: mass and damping
Morison Inertia or calculated
diffraction plus non- Mooring/DP model
linear Morison drag, -- [9-1 I] & (I .7.4)
....,.
wave drift and wind Riser model Hydrodynamic
forces [12-13J &(1.7.5) response analysis
Statistical analysis to 1 1
determine I 00 year
response values V Wave frequency, still
Time histories of Amplitude and water, wind, steady drift
motion response in phase of motion and slow drift response
irregular waves. response in regular (also required for
<I Extreme responses waves (RAOs) extreme analysis)
<>> ~

'--
Structural analysis
Alternative frequency domain
extreme response calculations and statistical analysis
Selected time instants ~

from extreme response Global structural model Structural analysis
time histories V [6J &(1.7.6) r---------.
Each wave applied to
Apply to structural 'quasi-static' structural
model using 'quasi-static' Local detail models model as a complex pair
analysis with balancing Simple load cases - of load cases. Wind
mass times acceleration produce 'Stress I--- gusting may also be
forces Concentration Factors' applied.
~ [7J & (1.7.7) t:

Local detail models with
loading cases as for and
Yield buckling models linked to global model Fatigue model [7,8,1 OJ
[7,8J&(1.7.9) [6] &(1.7.8) & (1.7.10)

~- ~ l
Extreme structural Extreme structural Fatigue from local Fatigue from global
response from response from local
global model model model model with SCFs
~ ~ --...._ ~
'- '- Figure 1.15 Overview of extreme and fatigue analysis, with references to chapters: [1 and following sections: ( )


Analyses need to be undertaken for various conditions and stages of a platform. For example:

• construction,

• transportation,

• installation,

• accidental conditions,

• earthquake,

• platform icing and sea ice,

• abandonment.

Mayall be taken into account.

Static, dynamic and quasi-static analysis

Often in this book an analysis is described as being either: static, dynamic or quasi-static:

A static analysis involves the solution of a matrix equation of the type: [Known stiffness] times {Unknown displacements} = {Known forces} or:

Kx = F

A dynamic analysis is required where the

[mass] times {acceleration} or [damping] times {velocity}

terms are important. The form of matrix equation to be solved is then:

Mx + Cx + Kx = F

A quasi-static analysis is often possible when the body is accelerating essentially as a rigid body. Dynamic analysis must be applied to determine rigid body acceleration but, once these accelerations are determined, the structural calculations can be performed statically using the known rigid body accelerations i r and velocities x r to

modify the forcing term :

Kx=F Mi =c:

r r

This combination of dynamic rigid body analysis and quasi-static structural analysis is used for most work on floating structures. Structural dynamic analysis is, however, required to determine the response to slamming and impact loads. Structural dynamic analysis is also required for the mooring system. For catenary moorings the dynamic analysis may be performed on single catenaries with defined vessel motion as a top boundary condition and distributed fluid loading along the length of the catenary. For a tension leg platform the integrated hull and tether system needs to be the subject of the dynamic analysis, however, although the tether model needs a lot of detail the dynamic hull model only needs to provide appropriate stiffnesses connecting the tops of the tethers.

When undertaking dynamic analysis it is also necessary to select frequency or time domain analysis.

Frequency domain analysis is quicker and usually provides important insights into behaviour such as natural frequencies and the variation of response with excitation frequency. It is however essentially linear i.e. it is only correct for cases where the response is proportional to the load and often where the response is proportional to wave height. This is usually the case in small waves and it is often a useful basis for fatigue analysis.

Time domain analysis: In large waves hydrodynamic and mooring system non-linearities become important and they are often very difficult to calculate with confidence. The linear frequency domain methods typically at best only provide a reasonable approximation and sometimes a totally incorrect and misleading estimate of the response. Therefore, in large waves, methods which account for the non-linearities should be used. To some extent non-linear frequency domain methods can be applied e.g. to the slow drift oscillation of a ship or second order springing forces (see Chapter 3), however in general for non-linear behaviour a time domain analysis will be more appropriate.

This is discussed further in Section 6.1.3.


Relative importance of different environmental loads

Before discussing the environmental data in detail it is instructive to review some calculated horizontal mooring forces on various types of (one) fixed and several floating platforms, Figures I, 16 to 1,20 (Rainey and Barltrop, 1995) indicate the relative importance of different environmental forces (base shear or horizontal component of mooring force) on ajacket a 200,000 tonne FPSO, a 30,000 tonne semi-submersible and a 160,000 tonne TLP, All are in 150m of water with 37,5m!s mean hourly wind speed, lm!s current and wave heights up to 15m significant. Note that if the current was doubled to 2m!s the current force would quadruple and become important in all cases,

Some conclusions of importance are:

• In comparison with a jacket where wave frequency loading dominates the design with current being of some importance;

Wind may be very important for a semi-submersible or TLP, Wave drift forces are very important for a ship,

• For a floating structure the relative importance of the different environmental forces are generally more similar (than for a jacket), This implies that joint probability effects may be more important for a floating than for a fixed structure,

• The environmental force on a semi-submersible, TLP or Spar is not sensitive to the direction of the environmental loads, For these platform types the assumption of collinear sea, swell, current and wind is likely to result in a conservative estimate of loading and mooring force,

• For a ship shape there is a very big difference between head and beam weather forces, For a weathervanning ship this also implies that the relative direction of wind, sea, swell and current will be important (because non collinear wind, waves etc, will result in a non-optimum heading for some of the forces which will considerably increase them), Therefore an assumption of collinear weather may, be unconservative when assessing mooring forces, for a weathervaning ship, Methods for dealing with this behaviour are discussed in more detail below,

1.7.1 Extreme environmental data required for analysis

Return period criteria

The simplest environmental data to use for design are the combined individual e.g. 100-year return period values (see Section 2,8 and Figure L21), These are the individual most probable maximum values in that period, The precise return period chosen largely depends on the regulatory authority and the oil company, The level of safety is not solely dependent on the return period, safety factors, for instance, will also have a large effect and overall it is anticipated that the strength of the structure should only be exceeded by conditions which would be expected to occur once in about 104 to 106 years, It is sometimes argued that a better approach is to design for a 104_106 year event and, for instance, the NPD regulations do require additional checks with these higher return period loads,

If the response is dominated by one environmental parameter e.g. wave loading then combining the separate 100- year return period responses is satisfactory, The environmental data might provide information about directional maxima so different values may be appropriate for different directions, This may be allowed for in mooring and flexible riser design,

Commonly several metocean parameters will be important This leads to three problems:

• The assumption that all the individual maxima occur at the same time may be too onerous and result in an excessively expensive design,

For some types of structure the maximum wave force occurs with the largest waves, however, for a ship or barge the largest forces may occur with moderately large waves having a lower period than the largest waves,

90 15.-------------------------------1

80 70


60

en ""C

~o

~o

s:

I- 30

20 10

o L_ ~==~L_ __ L_ ~==~ __ ~~

steady wave drift Mean current IMnd gusting

Mean hourly wnd Slow wave drift Wave frequency

Figure 1.16 Importance of various extreme forces acting on a jacket

15

r---
,--
.----
r---
n II 10

en ""C C

!l!

:::J o

j5:

5

o

Steady wave drift f\.Iean current IMnd gusting

f\.Iean hourly wind Slow wave drift Wave frequency

Figure 1.18 Importance of different beam-sea

extreme forces acting on an FPSO

10

(J)

""C

C

'"

(J)

:::J

o

.c

1-5

O~=='-'-----L-'----'-..___---'--'----'-'----'---'

Steady wave drift Mean current Wind gusting

Mean hourly wnd Slow wave drift Wave frequency

Figure 1.20 Importance of various extreme forces acting on a TLP

10

en ""C C

!l!

:::J o s:

I- 5

0~ __ _Ll_~~==~L_~~L_~ __ ~

Steady wave drift Mean current IMnd gusting

Mean hourly wind Slow wave drift Wave frequency

Figure 1.17 Importance of different head-sea

extreme forces acting on an FPSO

10

en ""C c

Vl

:::J o

j5:

5

OL- __ ..L____l_l_ __ __I_l __ --L_L_ __ .L...L_--'---'

steady wave drift f\.Iean current Wnd gusting

f\.Iean hourly wnd Slow wave drift Wave frequency

Figure 1.19 Importance of different extreme forces

acting on a semi-submersible


.. The assumption that the worst conditions are when the directions of sea, swell, current and wind are all aligned will usually be conservative for semis, TLPs, spars and conventionally moored ships and barges. The collinearity assumption may be conservative or unconservative for a ship or barge on a single point mooring. (As discussed above.)

Response based environmental design criteria

To avoid excessive conservatism, to allow for the likelihood of largest ship response in moderate but not the largest waves and to rationally design for non-optimum heading angles of a single point moored tanker the industry is starting to use a response based criterion for the assessment of extreme loading design combinations (Marshall and Rezvan, 1995). An overall flow diagram for response based design is shown in Figure 1.21. Using this method the response of the platform is estimated and extrapolated to e.g. 1 OO-year values using extreme value statistical methods (as opposed to extrapolating the individual environmental effects to the e.g. 1 OO-year values or attempting to construct an extreme joint probability description of the environment). The method usually relies on hindcasting sea, swell and wave driven current from atmospheric pressure data (which unlike wave and current data is available for a long period of time). A time history of environmental conditions (Hs"a, TZ,ea> HS,well, TZ,,"'elh mean wind speed and wind driven current) is obtained, typically at 3 to 6 hourly intervals. In addition to these tidal currents, other (non wind driven) currents and sea level variation are estimated. The overall environment can then be applied to a simplified mathematical model (or polynomial equation fitted to represent the behaviour) of key rigid body and structural responses. A time history of the peak responses to the combination of all these environmental loads is then generated for each hour of simulation. Many of the loads may be regarded as quasi static over each 1 hour period, however the wave frequency and slow drift frequency parts of wave and wind loading will need some non-linear rule for their combination which will depend on the assessment of likely correlation.

The storm by storm time history of response over many years is then subject to extreme value analysis (as described in Section 2.8) in order to determine the extreme values of each of the responses as predicted by the simplified model. Because the calculated responses are obtained from a simplified model and because they are only a limited number of the many responses and internal stresses that need to be considered for design, these responses are not used directly for design. Instead they are used, in conjunction with the simplified model, to determine a range of simple loading conditions which duplicate the extreme conditions found from the extreme value analyses. These loading conditions are then applied to a detailed model of the platform. The accuracy of the overall approach, including the simple model needs to be determined. It may be that the safety factors determined by code calibrations for existing techniques applied to fixed structures may not be appropriate for these response based methods.

Environmental loads typically considered for design

The types of environmental data required for extreme value analysis are:

Wind

A gust speed and its variation with height or a mean hourly wind speed and a wind spectrum may be used (Section 2.5). The traditional approach has been to use a one minute average gust applied as a static load. Occasionally the mean plus turbulence spectral analysis method is used to obtain a more accurate assessment of response both for extreme and fatigue loading. The turbulence may be described at a single point in one or all three directions. More accurate analysis is possible with cross spectral models defining the coherence between the wind turbulence at different points.

Current

Currents may have many components as described in Section 2.6. In some enclosed areas, such as the North sea, the tidal and wind driven currents are dominant. However in other areas, such as West of Shetland, many other currents become important. Currents are usually considered to have long periods in comparison with any natural frequencies of the platforms, so they can be considered as steady during the one hour periods. Their effect on fatigue is usually to determine the mean position about which the structure oscillates under the effect of waves and wind. Current will also affect damping: increased current will lead to higher levels of form drag on hull and moorings and therefore higher damping of slow drift motion.


Currents independent of wind

Tidal data

Key:

D

D

Data and models

-,

Use of simplified model

Pressure data (Measured over many tens of years)

Detailed model of platform responses (rigid body and structural)

Hindcast time-history of sea, swell, wind, currents and surge from pressure data

Simplified mathematical I model of key responses (simple equation to allow rapid processing through tens of years of directional I

environmental

L -=d;~iOnS) _I

------'-----..,

I

I I I I I I I L----1-----~

1----- -----..,

I Extreme value analysis

I to determine most

I probable I 00 year

: responses of simple

I model I

~====I====:

Wind driven and wind independent currents added

Storm by storm results of key responses of simple model

Selection of simple 'representative design' environmental conditions to give 100 year responses of simple model

Processes and intermediate results

Final results

L ......

Apply 'representative design' environmental conditions (with appropriate dead and functional loads ) to detailed platform model and determine detailed platform response

Estimates of extreme 100 yr motion and stress responses of detailed model

Figure 1.21 Response based analysis methodology


Currents will generate vortices as they interact with the platform and these might result in vortex induced vibration (VIV) see Section 3.10. This is considered for steel risers and Spar platforms. Semis and TLPs whilst theoretically susceptible to vortex induced vibration do not seem to have been so in practice, perhaps owing to the multiple relatively short columns and flow interference from pontoons.

Water level

Changes of water level (Section 2.6) in deep water are usually quite small. Even a I to 2 m change in water level has a relatively small effect on a conventionally moored platform but this change would be significant for a TLP.

Wave

Waves (Section 2.7) result in a steady drift force, a slowly varying drift force (and response at the natural frequency of the platform on its mooring) and a wave frequency force. Wave period is as important as wave height in determining the wave force.

Fatigue environmental data

For the fatigue analysis it is necessary to estimate the through life environmental conditions (i.e. combinations of directional sea, swell, wind and current that the platform will encounter during its life (see Sections 2.10 and 2.11). The smallest and largest waves do not contribute significantly to the fatigue damage. For welded steel, fatigue is usually assumed independent of mean stress so steady forces do not directly affect the fatigue life calculation. However it is found in practice that there is a beneficial effect of compression on fatigue. Furthermore steady forces may affect fatigue through non-linear responses such as the dynamic response of the mooring system, the orientation of a ship hull to sea and swell and, in some cases, the dynamic response of stiffened plating.

F or a semi, a TLP or a SPAR the fatigue analysis of the hull will be largely dependent on the sea and swell conditions. Therefore (as for a traditionaljacket spectral analysis) a directional sea state scatter diagram is all that is required. Swell will only be considered properly (typically by adding a separate swell spectrum into the analysis and so obtaining a multi peaked sea plus swell spectrum - Section 2.7.3) if it is of particular importance as, for instance, off the west coasts of Africa and Australia. Otherwise its contribution to the sea states is taken into account approximately, by using a single peak spectrum and an Hs and Tz corresponding to the sea and swell conditions. The fatigue analysis of the moorings should take into account the mean forces (owing to their nonlinear response) so some assessment of one or more suitable mean forces to use with each sea state should be made.

For a single point moored ship it is difficult to determine the combinations of wave, wind and current that should be used for fatigue calculation. Often in the past estimates based on offshore observations have been used to, for instance, determine the proportion of time a single point moored vessel takes different headings to the sea. However, if a response based extreme load design method is used, then it is possible to process many years of meteorological data to determine a full picture of the environment conditions and hence the distribution of absolute and relative-to-sea heading angles and to determine certain correlations in the data. It is still difficult to determine and process all the combinations of sea, swell, wind, current and draught that will affect the fatigue calculations so a simplified approach using knowledge gained from the environmental data may be used. The swell may for instance typically come from a single direction and not vary greatly. The vessel angle may be correlated to some extent with the sea direction. The mooring line tension may be correlated to some extent with the sea state. On the basis of some understanding of the data the analyst will, using' engineering judgement', select a suitable set of fatigue sea, current and wind states for the fatigue calculations. The selected conditions may be different for the analysis of the lower mooring system and turret, the turret region of the ship and the main structure of the ship.


1 "7.2 Hydrostatics

Stability assessment

Clearly "an assessment of intacf and damaged hydrostatic stability is a critical part of the design and analysis of any floating structure. Small angle stability / metacentric height (including the free surface effects which are of particular importance for FPSOs and FSUs are discussed in Sections 4.3 and 4.5). Practical large angle stability calculations require computer simulation. Often it is necessary to solve for displacement, heel and trim at the same time. Practical methodology is given in Sections 4.7 and 4.9,

In general the following can cause difficulties and need special care:

• Longitudinal compartmentalisation of double skinned ships: It is cheapest to avoid longitudinal subdivision of the large central oil tanks. To reduce longitudinal bending moments it can be advantageous to have several slack tanks. However this can result in unsatisfactory transverse stability as well as increasing structural bending moments.

• Semi-submersibles, owing to their small water plane area and inertia are sensitive both to total weight and its position. If a large weight is placed away from the centre of gravity then another large weight of ballast will need to be applied to avoid heeling the vessel. Both the weight and the ballast will increase the draught. Weight applied above the metacentre will reduce the stability.

• TLPs are primarily sensitive to weight because, once all ballast has been discharged, any increase in weight immediately leads to a drop in tether tension and this will make slack tether conditions in large waves more likely to occur.

As well as traditional naval architecture stability analysis it is important to apply hazard analysis and risk assessment principles to the design and operation of the ballast system. This is described in Sections 4.16 and 4.17.

Hydrostatic properties for hydrodynamic and structural analysis

Typically the hydrodynamic model for platform motion calculation is a rigid body model. For linear calculations all that is required is a stiffuess matrix to represent the hydrostatics. For the calculation of the behaviour in large waves a program which estimates static plus dynamic pressures over the instantaneously wetted surface is preferable. This is discussed in Sections 4.13 and Annexes 3D and 4F.

For structural analysis, a quasi-static model (Section l.7 above) with directly applied gravity, acceleration and pressure loads will usually be satisfactory.

In some circumstances, when a non-linear dynamic analysis of a ship hull is undertaken, a dynamic hull model is used with hydrostatic stiffuess distributed over the hull. Care has to be taken to distinguish between, but to allow for, both the true hydrostatic stiffness and the reduced roll and pitch stiffuess that results from the centre of gravity being higher than the centre of buoyancy and resulting in an additional roll moment. For the quasi-static hull strength and fatigue analyses an equivalent spring system or a calculated pressure distribution (as described in Sections 3.6.5, 4.13 and 6.2) may be applied. Care needs to be taken to properly include the effect of roll angle on the gravity force, either through GM or as a directly applied force.

1.7.3 Hydrodynamic loading and response models

The appropriate model depends on the type of structure and the type of analysis being performed.

For a semi-submersible a Morison model (Section 3.6.4) is likely to be good in extreme waves because diffraction effects are small and the wave loading is dominated by drag and inertia forces. A time domain calculation in irregular waves will give the best response estimates although a frequency domain calculation with linearised drag should give reasonable estimates of response away from the heave and pitch natural frequencies. In smaller waves, appropriate to fatigue analysis, diffraction (modification to the waves caused by the structure) becomes important


and so a linear diffraction analysis will commonly replace the Morison inertia loading. The drag is linearised and has a loading component but it also makes an important contribution to damping resonant responses. Frequency domain spectral techniques are generally applicable for fatigue calculations, however the size of the predicted resonant responses needs to be checked to make sure that the drag force and drag damping linearisation are consistent with the predicted response. A Morison inertia force based semi-submersible response calculation is undertaken in Section 5C. Steady and slowly varying drift forces are not usually very important for a semisubmersible but they may be calculated using results from a linear diffraction model. Current and wind loading are calculated using a drag coefficient approach.

For a TLP the wave frequency loads may be handled as for a semi-submersible. However the high frequency springing forces (Section 3.8) are also important as these can cause resonant heave and pitch motion at natural frequencies that are higher than the wave frequencies. These require a non-linear diffraction analysis. Even a second order analysis is time consuming and difficult to perform and at present it is not clear whether a second order analysis is sufficient or whether even higher orders are required. It is therefore usual to supplement any high order diffraction calculations with model tests. Ringing (Section 3.9.7) is another high order hydrodynamic loading effect that can generate episodic transient pitch responses. Its importance can be estimated by calculation but again model tests are usually used to gain confidence in the likely level of response.

The analysis required for a Spar is similar to that required for a semi-submersible. However it will typically have a larger diameter so diffraction effects are likely to be more important and the long single tubular column type may be prone to vortex induced vibration in currents, so a vortex shedding response analysis (Section 3.10) is required.

The response of a ship to wave loading is usually analysed using either a linear 3-D diffraction analysis (Section 3.6.5) or a linear 2-D strip method analysis (Section 3.6.6). The 2-D method applies, to any cross section of the ship, the results of a diffraction analysis of a long prismatic shape of approximately the same cross section. 2-D analysis should preferably be used in conjunction with a correction for axial pressures. Both analyses require the empirical assessment of roll damping but then provide good estimates of the response of a ship in small waves and are directly useful for fatigue analysis. A simplified strip theory analysis of a ship, which demonstrates some of the basic principles whilst using approximate hydrodynamic coefficients, is given in Annex 5B.

In large waves linear diffraction results are only a first approximation to the response particularly because they do not allow for the effects of intermittent wetting of the hull surface. There are several effects some of which reduce the hull girder loading (Section 3.6) but some of which (particularly bottom and flare slamming) make the loading worse (Section 3.9). The effect of non-linearities on the response is usually quite small although it can affect the calculated intensity of slamming. Slamming itself is accounted for either by a slamming pressure integration or by a rate of change of momentum calculation. The latter may conveniently be linked with the rate of change of added mass as calculated from (usually 2-D) diffraction theory analyses at different draughts.

In addition to the wave frequency and impulsive loading a ship is also subject to steady (Section 3.2) and (in a sea) slowly varying drift forces (Section 3.7). These drift forces, although non-linear, may be calculated by post processing the results of linear diffraction analysis.

Wind forces acting on a ship superstructure and transverse current forces are calculated using drag force equations. Longitudinal current forces are calculated using equations developed for ship resistance estimation (Section 3.2).

1.7.4 Mooring I DP models

Moorings and tethers

The moorings may be accounted for in the analysis by either:

• coupling a detailed mooring model to the hydrodynamic loading and response model, or


.. simplifying the moorings to either a linear stiffness matrix or a quasi static catenary model, coupling this to the overall hydrodynamic analysis and solving for the platform response. The detailed behaviour of the mooring lines may then be obtained by applying the calculated top of mooring deflections to the detailed dynamic lllOoqng model so obtaining the forces in individuallines/tethers etc ..

For fatigue analysis of all types of floating structure the linear stiffness matrix method of representing moorings or tethers, is usually the most convenient because it is consistent with frequency domain analysis of rigid body response, stress transfer functions and spectral fatigue calculation of the response to wave frequency, drift frequency and wind gust motions (Sections 3.7 and SD).

Vortex induced vibration is also conveniently analysed in the frequency domain (Section 3.10).

For extreme response calculation of catenary moored platforms the usual method is to use quasi-static catenary models for the global analysis with dynamic analysis of individual lines (Sections 9.3 to 9.5). This avoids highly complex full line dynamic global analyses on the assumption that line dynamics may be important for individual lines but it should not significantly affect the overall response.

For extreme response of a TLP a fully coupled analysis is preferable owing to the inherent coupling of hull and tether dynamics (Section 11.4).

DP

For structural design purposes it is usual to discuss the DP system characteristics with the DP designer and to allow for its characteristics approximately, for example by a representative mass-spring damping system. DP systems are discussed in Chapter 10.

1.7.5 Riser models

For global platform analysis 'rigid' and flexible risers are usually modelled as a simple system with mass, damping, stiffness and loading effects on the hull (see Sections 12.3 and 13.8 to 13.9).

As in dynamic mooring line analysis the individual riser would be checked with a detailed model subject to distributed hydrodynamic loading and top deflections obtained from the global platform analysis.

1.7.6 Global structural models

The global structural model may be a stick model, a shell element or a brick element model (See Section 6.5). Opinions differ as to which are the most appropriate. The Editor prefers stick models at the early stages of design, because these models are relatively quick to run and engender an understanding of the structural response and overall forces to be taken: a ship or Spar model would essentially be a line of elements; a semi or TLP model would be line beams for the pontoons, columns and hull braces with a deck probably modelled as a grillage infilled with plate elements to obtain the correct in plane shear properties.

The disadvantage of a line beam model is that it does not give information on the distribution of forces inside the section. For instance the 'shear lag' effect which makes a wide flanged cross section less efficient when subject to a changing bending moment along its length or the distribution of stresses in a double side tanker have to be estimated separately.

A coarse mesh finite element model of a complete platform can be set up to provide this information. It is likely to be made from a large number of substructures or super elements (groups of elements representing e.g. a length of pontoon). However the large amount of data generated tends to obscure the basic overall force and moment pattern in the structure, so it should be run in addition to the stick model, not in place of it. The results of the two analyses should be cross checked.


The global, structural analysis model will be subject to static (weight, buoyancy, ballast and mean mooring forces), modification to static loads caused by roll and pitch angles and heave displacement, acceleration forces on the structure and ballast, and the hydrodynamic pressures on the hull. The dynamic loading may be represented as a set of quasi-static load cases in dynamic equilibrium. Alternatively the dynamic effects of hydrodynamic loading, mooring forces, accelerations, roll etc may be represented by a pairs of load cases each regarded as a complex pair. For extreme loading calculations and structural checks it is necessary to obtain specific, quasistatic, loading combinations. The analyst may set these up manually, however it is often not straightforward to select the worst cases. Alternatively therefore the analyst may define the loading rules to an enveloping program which will select worst loading cases and possibly wave phase angles for each component being checked.

For fatigue analysis the dynamic pressures on the hull, mooring, acceleration, roll and pitch forces etc. will be obtained from the global platform analysis. Complex pairs ofload cases will represent the amplitude and phase of each loading component and the output will represent the real and imaginary parts of the response to each wave frequency. Spectral analysis techniques may then be used for the fatigue calculations (Section 7.5). A similar approach may be used to represent the gust and possibly the drift frequency response. The latter are mainly of interest in the immediate area of the mooring connections.

1.7.7 local detail SCFs

A shell or brick model global structural analysis will rarely have a fine enough mesh to adequately predict stresses in the areas of stress concentration where fatigue problems are most likely to occur. Often the stress concentration can be regarded as being acted on by a limited number of primary forces e.g. global bending and external pressure. In this case it is efficient to calculate stress concentration factors which are used to multiply the basic stresses from the global analysis prior to the calculation of the fatigue lives. The SCFs may be calculated from a structure specific local finite element model or they may be obtained from published data or formulae for ship details.

1.7.8 local detail models

When a component contains a large number of locations to be checked it is still possible to generate SCFs as in Section 1.7.7. However it often becomes more convenient to apply loading and or deflections to the detailed model corresponding to the load cases on the global model. When possible, loadings should be used because generally the structure is being designed to resist loading and applying deflections from a coarse model to a fine model may result in lower stresses in the fine model because it will tend to be more flexible than the coarse model.

When setting up the local detail model thought should be given on how the results will be used for instance:

• The application of pressure loading needs careful consideration. Application of pressure to individual plates will require each physical plate panel to be meshed by say 9 elements. This may result in an impractically large model. If instead the local moments in plates are calculated from first principles, as part of a post processing operation, then the mesh can be much coarser.

• Similarly the model can be made much simpler if stiffeners in the analysis are either not subject to local pressure loading or are decoupled from the plate (which in reality acts as a stiffener flange). However again the post processing must be compatible with the local detail modelling. (see Section 6.5)

1 .7.9 Yield / buckling checks

Yield and buckling checks are performed using standard programs or codes of practice (Section 7.6). The checks may be based on the global analysis results or on the local detail models. Generally a number of stress components need to be considered at the same time. The selection of worst cases is discussed above. Thorough analysis of yield and buckling requires checks on large numbers of frames, stiffeners and plates. The amount of


work required is considerable, both for the analyst in describing the structural details to any software being used and for the computer performing the analysis.

1 .7.10 Fatigue analysi$'

Fatigue checks are based on standard S-N curves for different types of details. The analysis has to be carefully set up so that a suitable reference stress can be obtained for use with the S-N curve. This is straightforward for a butt weld with no other local stress concentrations. The stress from the finite element analysis can be input directly into the appropriate S-N curve. However many details, e.g. a stiffener toe, will have a fatigue class which includes some allowance for the SCF which may also be predicted by the finite element analysis. Care is therefore required to avoid omitting or double counting stress concentration effects.

References

Ahilan, R.Y., Baker, MJ. and Snell, R.O., 1993, Development of Jack-up Assessment Criteria using Probabilistic Methods, OTC 7305, Houston.

API: see Annex lB.

Barltrop N.D.P. and Rainey RCT, 1985, Floating and compliant platforms: response to environmental loads. E&P Forum, Workshop on uncertainties in the design process, UK.

Brown and Root, 1994, AFP concept option study, private communication, with permission of Shell and BP.

Hamilton, 1. and Perrett, G.R, 1986, Deep water tension leg platform designs, Proc. RINA Int. Symp. Developments in Deeper Waters, 6-7 October.

Henery D. and Inglis RB., 1995, Prospects and Challenges for the FPSO, OTC 7695, 27th Offshore Technology Conference, Houston.

Holmes J. and Verghese 1., 1995, Subsea Developments in Very Deep Water, 8th Deep Offshore Technology Conference, Rio De Janeiro, November.

HSE: see Annex 1 C.

Inglis RB., 1993, The Role of the Production Ship In Deep Water Field Development, 7th Deep Offshore Technology Conference, Monaco, November.

Inglis RB., 1996, Production facilities selection for deep water oil and gas field development, IESIS, (Instn. Engnrs. and Shipbuilders in Scotland), vol. 139.

Madsen, A. and Gallimore, D., 1993, Offshore Production Concepts, Oilfield Publications, UK.

Moses, F., 1989, Tutorial on LRFD for Fixed Offshore Platforms,. API PRAC 88-22 Report.

Ocean Industry, 1992, 1992 Guide to Marine Drilling Rigs, Gulf Publishing, Houston.

OPL, 1997, Single point moorings, wall chart, Oilfield Publications Ltd., Ledbury, UK.

Steeves, M., 1989, The Halyard Guide to Single Point Moorings of the World, Oilfield Publications Ltd., UK.

Annex 1A Worldwide floating production platforms
Field Name Country Start-up Date Operator Water Vessel
Depth Type
(m)
Adanga, Akam, Ebughu Nigeria 1986 AshlandINNPC 42 Ship
Albacora Phase 1 Brazil 1993 Petrobras 252 Semi-sub
Albacora Phase 2 Brazil 1996 Petrobras 650 Semi-sub
Albacora Phase 3 Brazil 1997 Petrobras 330 Ship
Anequim and Parati Brazil 1982 Petrobras 109 Semi-sub
Anoa Indonesia 1990 Amoseas 77 Ship
Angus UK 1991 Amerada Hess 100 Ship
Aquila Italy 1995 Agip 820 Ship
Argyll UK 1975 Hamilton 76 Semi-sub
Asgard Norway 1998 Statoil 300 Ship
Auger USA 1994 Shell 872 TLP
Badejo and Trilha Brazil 1984 Petrobras 100 Semi-sub
Balder Norway 1997 Esso Norge 126 Ship
Balmoral and G1amis UK 1986 Sun Oil 128 Semi-sub
Barracuda Brazil 1997 Petrobras 850 Ship
Bicudo Brazil 1988 Petrobras 209 Semi-sub
Bijupira and Salema Phase 1 Brazil 1993 Petrobras 600 Semi-sub
Blenheim UK 1995 ARCO 148 Ship
Bohai China 1993 JCODC 30 Ship
Bonito and Enchova Brazil 1983 Petrobras 189 Semi-sub
Bozhong 28-1 China 1989 JCODC 23 Barge
Bozhong 34-2 China 1990 JCODC 20 Ship
Buchan UK 1981 BP 118 Semi-sub
Cadlao Philippines 1981 Alcorn 93 Ship
Cad1ao and Martinloc Philippines 1992 Alcorn 350 Ship
Captain UK 1996 Texaco 105 Ship
Caravela Brazil 1994 Petrobras 365 Semi-sub
Casablanca Spain 1979 Eniepsa 162 Semi-sub
Castellon Spain 1977 Shell 117 Ship
Challis and Cassini Australia 1989 BHP Petroleum 120 Barge 1-48 Floating structures: a guide for design and analysis
Depth Type
"--). (m)
1,.,_
.,
~L
Coral -s Brazil 1991 Petrobras 155 Semi-sub
Corvina Brazil 1983 Petrobras 225 Semi-sub
Cossack and Wanaea Australia 1995 Woodside 77 Ship
Curlew UK 1997 Shell 76 Ship
Cyrus UK 1990 BP 122 Ship
D-19 India 1988 ONGC Semi-sub
Dai Hung Vietnam 1995 BHP Petroleum 119 Semi-sub
Donan/Cyrus UK 1993 BP 140 Ship
Dorada Spain 1978 Eniepsa 94 Semi-sub
Dragon Vietnam 1994 Vietsovpetro 48 Ship
Duncan UK 1984 Hamilton 79 Semi-sub
Durward, Dauntless UK 1997 Amerada Hess 95 Ship
El Zeit Bay Egypt 1985 Conoco 40 Ship
Emerald UK 1992 MSR 152 Semi-sub
Enchova Brazil 1989 Petrobras 122 Semi-sub
Enchova Brazil 1977 Petrobras 122 Semi-sub
Ewing Bank USA 1996 Deeptech 457 Semi-sub
Fife UK 1995 Amerada Hess 70 Ship
Foinaven UK 1997 BP 450 Ship
Garden Banks USA 1995 Enserch 640 Semi-sub
Garoupa Brazil 1979 Petrobras 120 Semi-sub
Griffin,Chinook and Scindian Australia 1994 BHP Petroleum 130 Ship
Gryphon UK 1993 Kerr McGee 112 Ship
Heidrun Norway 1995 Conoco 351 TLP
Huizhou 21-1/26-1 China 1990 ACT Group 116 Ship
Hudson UK 1993 Amerada Hess 72 Ship
Hutton UK 1984 Conoco 148 TLP
lntan Sumatra 1989 Maxus Energy 49 Ship
lnvanhoe, Rob Roy, Hamish Fie UK 1989 Amerada Hess 142 Semi-sub
Jabiru Australia 1986 BHP 122 Ship
Jolliet USA 1989 Conoco 536 TLP
Kakap KH Indonesia 1986 Marathon 87 Ship Concept selection and design principles 1-49
Depth Type
(m)
Kiabo Angola 1994 Sonangol 75 Ship
Laminaria Australia 1998 Woodside 120 Ship
Linguado Brazil 1983 Petrobras 100 Semi-sub
Liuhua 11-1 China 1996 Amoco Orient 305 Ship
Lufeng 22-1 Phase II China 1997 Ampolex 330 Ship
MacCulloch UK 1997 Conoco 141 Ship
Machar UK 1994 BP 100 Semi-sub
Marimba Brazil 1993 Petrobras 425 Semi-sub
Marlim Brazil 1992 Petrobras 636 Semi-sub
Marlim Brazil 1997 Petrobras 163 Ship
Marlim Brazil 1997 Petrobras 910 Semi-sub
Marlim Phase I Brazil 1994 Petrobras 1000 Semi-sub
Marlim phase II Brazil 1997 Petrobras 779 Ship
Marlim phase III Brazil 1998 Petrobras 854 Ship
Mars USA 1996 Shell 893 TLP
Maui B New Zealand 1995 Shell Todd Oil 110 Ship
Moreia Brazil 1986 Petrobras 122 Semi-sub
N'Kossa Congo 1996 Elf Congo 158 Barge
Nemba Angola 1998 Chevron III Ship
Nido Philippines 1977-83 Cities 73 Ship
Nilde Italy 1985 Agip 96 Ship
Njord Norway 1997 Norsk Hydro 300 Semi-sub
Nome Norway 1997 Statoil 380 Ship
OPL-98 Nigeria 1986 Ashland 37 Ship
Oseberg Norway 1986-88 Norsk Hydro 109 Ship
Pirauna Brazil 1989 Petrobras 520 Semi-sub
Schiehallion UK 1998 BP 425 Ship
Sembilang Indonesia 1994 Conoco 91 Barge
Skua Australia 1991 BHP Petroleum 80 Ship
Snorre Norway 1992 Saga 341 TLP
South Tano Ghana 1993 GNPC 90 Ship
Statfjord North Norway 1995 Green Seas OPS Ship 1-50 Floating structures: a gUide for design and analysis
Depth Type
:>--._.;~ (m)
~
~;'i
Talisman '~. Australia 1989 Marathon 80 Ship
Tantawan Thailand 1997 125 Ship
Tazerka Tunisia 1982 Samedan 143 Ship
T eal/ Guillemot UK 1996 Shell 90 Ship
Trilha Brazil 1984 Petrobras 105 Semi-sub
TrollB Norway 1996 Norsk Hydro 335 Semi-sub
Varg Norway 1998 Saga 90 Ship
Veslefrikk Norway 1989 Statoil 175 Semi-sub
Viola Brazil 1985 Petrobras 126 Semi-sub
Visund Norway 1998 Norsk Hydro 335 Semi-sub
Warda Field Egypt 1994 Zaafarana Oil Co. 56 Ship
Weizhou 10/3 China 1986 Nan Hai West Oil 37 Ship
Corp
West Linapacan A Philippines 1992 Alcorn 351 Ship
White Tiger Vietnam 1996 Vietsovpetro 50 Ship
Xijang China 1994 Phillips 100 Ship
Yombo Congo 1991 Nuevo Energy 114 Ship
Zafiro Equatorial 1996 Mobil 183 Ship
Guinea Note: some of these platforms have been removed.


Annex 1 B API recommended practices

Code Title

RP 2A~LFRD Recommended Practice for Planning Designing and Constructing Fixed Offshore Platforms - Load and Resistance Factor Design.

RP 2A-WSD Recommended Practice for Planning Designing and Constructing Fixed Offshore Platforms - Working Stress Design.

Spec 2F Specification for Mooring Chain.

RP 2FP 1 Recommended Practice for Design, Analysis and Maintenance of Moorings for Floating Production Systems.

Spec 2H Specification for Carbon Manganese Steel Plate for Offshore Platform Tubular Joints.

RP 21 Recommended Practice for In-Service Inspection of Mooring Hardware for Floating Drilling Units.

RP 2M Qualification Testing for Steel Anchor Designs for Floating Structures.

RP 2SK Recommended Practice for Design and Analysis of Stationkeeping Systems for Floating Structures.

RP 2P Recommended Practice for the Analysis of Spread Mooring Systems for Floating Drill Units.

RP 2T Recommended Practice for Planning, Designing and Constructing Tension Leg Platforms.

Bull2U Bulletin on Stability Design of Cylindrical Shells.

Bull 2V Bulletin on Design of Flat Plate Structures.

Spec 2W Specification for Steel Plates for Offshore Structures. Produced by Thermo-

Mechanical Control Processing (TMCP).

Spec 5L Specification for Line Pipe.

Spec 9A Specification for Wire Rope.

RP 9B Recommended Practice on Application, Care and Use of Wire Rope for Oil Field Service.

RP 16Q Recommended Practice for Design, Selection, Operation and Maintenance of Marine Drilling Riser Systems.

RP 17B Recommended Practice for Flexible Pipe.

RP 17G Recommended Practice for Design and Operation of Completion/Work-over Riser

Systems.

Spec l7J Specification for Unbonded Flexible Pipe.

Std 11 04 Welding of Pipelines and Related Facilities.

RP III Design, Construction, Operation and Maintenance of Offshore Hydrocarbon Pi elines.


Annex 1 C The UK regulatory regime

On 6 July 1988 an explosion ogjJle Piper Alpha platform led to the loss of 167 lives. A public enquiry followed which recommended a number o~Jhajor changes to the way in which safety on offshore installations is regulated in UK waters. In accordance with the recommendations, the responsibility for regulating safety offshore was transferred from the Department of Energy to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), and, in 1992, the Safety Case Regulations [1] were enacted.

The Safety Case Regulations are modem, 'goal-setting' regulations made under the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 [2]. They require that every installation operating in UK waters has an installation specific Safety Case which has been accepted by HSE. The principal matters to be demonstrated in the Safety Case are that:

(a) the management system is adequate to ensure compliance with statutory health and safety requirements;

(b) adequate arrangements have been made for audit, and preparation of audit reports; and

(c) all hazards with the potential to cause major accidents have been identified, their risks evaluated, and measures taken to reduce risks to persons to as low as reasonably practicable (ALARP).

The Safety Case Regulations are supported by three principal (offshore related) sets of regulation:

1. The Offshore Installations (prevention of Fire and Explosion. and Emergency Response) Regulations, 1995, (PFEER) [3].

2. The Offthore Installations and Pipeline Works (Management and Administration) Regulations, 1995, (MAR) [4].

3. The Offshore Installations and Wells (Design and Construction, etc) Regulations, 1996, (DCR) [5].

Of the four sets of regulations, the one of particular relevance to the topics presented in this publication, is the Design and Construction Regulations. DCR replaces the certification regime which operated in UK waters since the introduction ofthe Offshore Installations (Construction and Survey) Regulations [6] in 1974 (SI 289) by a system based on the independent verification of safety critical items. SI 289 was supported by a detailed set of Guidance Notes [7], references to which are made throughout this publication.

DCR further enforce the goal-setting nature ofthe Safety Case Regulations by removing the prescription present in SI 289. In particular DCR require that: 'The duty holder shall ensure that the designs to which an installation is to be or in the event is constructed are such that, so far as is reasonably practicable .... it can withstand such forces acting on it as are reasonablyforeseeable.' The supporting guidance to DCR indicates that it is expected that the design of the installation will be based on current good engineering practice, which is appropriately risk-based. Compliance with existing codes, standards and guidance may not be sufficient to meet the regulatory requirements. Reasonably foreseeable forces are considered to be those that a competent person in the field, exercising reasonable foresight, would identify in the light of current understanding. The SI 289 requirement to ensure that an installation is capable of withstanding the combined effects of (in particular) winds, waves and currents, each at the magnitude of the 50 year return period event, is no longer a statutory minimum.

In order to comply with the requirements of UK offshore regulations, designers or site assessors of floating structures, will need to be able to demonstrate an adequate understanding ofthe performance ofthe structures in the environments in which they are to operate. In particular they will need to demonstrate that the risks posed to individuals on the structures, as a result of environmental overload, are as low as reasonably practicable.


UK legislation (Other references are located before the Annexes)

1. The Offshore Installations (Safety Case) Regulations, 1992, (SI 1992/2885), HMSO, ISBN 0 11 025869 X.

2. The Health and Safety at Work etc Act, 1974, HMSO, 1991 (reprint), ISBN 0 105437743.

3. Prevention of fire and explosion, and emergency response on offshore installations. Offshore Installations Regulations 1995 and Approved Code of Practice and Guidance (L65), HSE Books, 1995, ISBN 0 7176 0874 3.

4. A guide to the Offshore Installations and Pipeline Works (Management and Administration Regulations, 1995, (L70), HSE Books, 1995, ISBN 0 7176 0938 3.

5. The Offshore Installations (Construction and Survey) Regulations, 1974, (SI 1974/289), HMSO, ISBN o 11 040289 8.

6. The Offihore Installations and Wells (Design and Construction etc) Regulations, 1996, (SI 1996/913), HMSO, ISBN 0 11 054451 X.

7. Offshore Installations: Guidance on Design, Construction and Certification (4th Edition), HSE Books, 1993, ISBN 0 11 882116 4.

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