From UTC-2015 Bergen: Statoil is within touching distance of realising the dream of completing its first ‘subsea factory’ as work on the offshore Norway Åsgard and Gullfaks (SEN 32/2) subsea gas compression projects pushes ahead.

Margareth Øvrum, Statoil’s executive vice president for technology told delegates at UTC that Åsgard will start up in Q3 this year and Gullfaks in Q4.

She said, ‘We are doing installation work on the two projects at the moment. On Åsgard nine of the 11 modules on the first compressor train are now installed. The installation work has been carried out by the North Sea Giant vessel.

‘The inlet cooler modules were installed last week. The inlet cooler together with the frame is 388t and the lift was done by a special handling unit. Åsgard subsea gas compression with its two trains, separators, mixers, pumps, spoolers and compressors is for all practical matters our first subsea factory in place.’

The Åsgard project, is expected to add 282mmboe, the equivalent of developing a small to medium sized field on the Norwegian Continental Shelf.

‘We have qualified 43 different technologies in this project and that is amazing,’ Øvrum added.

Meanwhile, she said installation of the two subsea wet gas compressors and cooler modules on the Gullfaks field has also begun.

‘On Gullfaks we will increase recovery by 22mmboe and I think the combination of large gas fields and long tiebacks of subsea wells will create large demand going forward for subsea gas compression. We are looking for more implementation opportunities.’

More than 50% of Statoil’s equity production comes from subsea and the company currently has 540 subsea wells in operation.

Øvrum added, ‘Subsea gas compression is no doubt a crucial technology and a key delivery to our mission of the subsea factory. With subsea compression we now have all the vital elements for a subsea factory in place.

‘We can control the production flow, we can separate oil gas and water on the sea floor and we can inject water back. We still need to further develop and refine several elements, for instance extended reach power supply and much better oil and water separation.’

Shell will start up its two mudline pumps to boost output from the offshore Norway Draugen (30/12) field next year.

The two pumps weigh 90t with the complete unit hitting the scales at 240t. Jan-Olav Hallset, Shell Norway’s team lead for SURF controls and distribution, said, ‘It is not only a pump but quite a complex system, which makes it more challenging. We will start it up next year. We have installed the manifold already and we will install the power module in 2016 and hook it up.’

He said the umbilical termination heads are much bigger and more complicated than standard. ‘The net value for Shell is that this will double production and we can also start the wells without gas lift which is an operational advantage. It is going to be exciting for us next year.’

Hallset also said Shell is looking at further development and increasing the reliability of the esp pumps, as well as making interventions on the BC-10 field offshore Brazil.

And on the Stones (32/2) hpht field in 2,900m in the GoM, Shell is hoping to soon qualify the artificial lift system for start-up in 2019.

Hallset added, ‘Without the pump for artificial lift we wouldn’t get anything out of the field. The pump is a high-boost single phase and it has quite a significant design pressure of over 1,000 bars. We have tried to qualify this pump system in preparation for the decision on going further with the Stones system. It is quite a step up in depth from Draugen.’

He told SEN ‘good news’ was expected shortly – watch this space.

Siemens Subsea is collaborating with four of the biggest oil companies, including Statoil, to qualify a full subsea power distribution system.

The main qualification tests are expected to be completed this year, with the final test in water happening in 2016, Bjorn Rasch, the company’s head of subsea power said.

He highlighted standalone variable subsea speed drives directly fed from topside switchgear to enable subsea boosting on brownfield projects.

‘Power is one of the last building blocks for the subsea factory,’ he said.

Mike Garding, ceo of OneSubsea, highlighted the success of a fast-track trees programme, developed several years ago to meet the requirements for a flexible well solution with reduced lead time and reduced capex.

‘The uptake of this solution has been particularly successful in the Gulf of Mexico and we’re expanding this to other regions globally. The pre-engineering components provide a common tree core that can then be configured with key components.’

He said the fast-track programme, compared with conventional, lead to delivery times being shortened by six months and costs coming in 20-30% lower.

He said, ‘This is a successful example of standardisation of design and manufacturing processes. Bespoke engineering and man hour costs are down. The re-use of proven solutions reduces risk, costs and lead times.’

Total will start up its subsea multiphase pumping system for the Girassol Resources Initiatives (GirRI) project offshore Angola in the next few weeks.

The multiphase pump system, which has bene installed in Block 17 in 1,350m, will boost the rates from two production flow loops.

OneSubsea (Framo) has provided a complete system of topside power and control and two subsea pump modules. The pump system is based on the latest development of the helico-axial technology, capable of a record differential pressure of up to 120 bar.

DNV GL explored the viability of moving offshore oil and gas processing subsea, including the techno-economics of an ‘all subsea’ solution.

Tore Kuhnle, senior researcher at DNV GL, said, ‘The industry has moved from ‘breaking boundaries’ to ‘cost cutting’ in recent years. In that respect, it is reassuring to see that subsea processing is both enabling and enhancing technology for brownfield applications.’

He said that even though brownfields will continue to drive subsea processing development, possibilities for greenfield applications have also been identified.

‘We see that the technology has matured considerably for limited-depth and limited-range applications. With our short-term focus, we see the completely submerged alternative more as a mature-area, midsize oilfield solution, rather than an extreme deepwater, long-range problem-solver.’

Helge Haldorsen, director general of Statoil Mexico, encouraged companies to get involved in the bidding rounds in Mexico.

He highlighted three very oily regions with 28bn bbl mean risked recoverable reserves and pointed out that on the Mexican side of the GoM only 35 wells have been drilled compared to 3,000 on the US side.

The culmination of round one takes place on July 15 when winners of 48 blocks will be announced.

He also suggested that a Norway Mexico technology co-operation agreement might be known as Nor-Taco!

Offshore