Offshore staff
STAVANGER, Norway – Construction work has started on facilities for the Statoil-operated Johan Sverdrup project in the central Norwegian North Sea.
Kværner in Verdal, western Norway, has cut first steel for the riser platform jacket. This will eventually weigh 26,500 metric tons (29,211 tons), the largest in waters anywhere offshore Europe, and also the most complex ever built, according to Statoil senior vice president for the Johan Sverdrup development project, Kjetel Digre.
“Not only will we route the land-based power through the jacket, we’ll also be controlling the subsea water injection and exporting the field’s oil and gas from it.
“In addition, we’re also preparing to tie in future phases of the Johan Sverdrup field development to the riser platform. In building this jacket, we’re in fact making preparations to take in as many as 56 conduits.”
The completed jacket will be installed at the field location in 2017. Due to its size, it will be shipped out of the yard on what is claimed to be the world’s largest barge for this type of transport, Heerema’sH-851. In order to receive the 260-m (853-ft) long vessel, the quay at Kværner Verdal is undergoing an upgrade.
Also under construction (at Vlissingen in the Netherlands) is the 246-metric ton (271-ton) template for the wells, which will be installed offshore either later this summer or during the fall. Wells will be pre-drilled on the field from March 2016.
06/29/2015
